NEW CONCEPTS AND IDEAS FOR
THE MOST RECENT INTERNET AND PRINT VERSIONS
AND THE PROLOGUE
ANIL MITRA PHD, July 1, 2005
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Introduction
In July 2003, with the completion of the essay Journey in Being, the knowledge foundation for the Journey in Being Project was also substantially complete
This was marked by revision and maturation of the foundations, synthesis and revision of almost all areas of my thought and writing
As a result, I embark upon the remaining phases – outlined in Journey in Being – of which the first is Dynamics and Experiments in the Transformation of Being
Of course, nothing is finally complete; new ideas are recorded below. For further plans for the Journey itself, see Design for a Journey in Being
The new content may be directly incorporated to Journey in Being or noted in Design for a Journey in Being
Supplements
The purpose of the SUPPLEMENTS is to avoid the need to repeatedly revise, upload and reprint the present document
Planning details for the Prologue and Journey in Being are in the sections for those documents. For remaining documents, minor changes may be done at any time but major changes that are not part of the ‘Journey’ are deferred until ‘after’ it
1. JOURNEY IN BEING AND FOUNDATION
Journey in Being and Foundation: New Concept, Concepts, Organization and Outline
2. MATHEMATICS AND ITS FOUNDATIONS
3. WORDS / BEING AND METAPHYSICS: A LEXICON
4. DESIGN FOR A JOURNEY IN BEING
5. HISTORY OF WESTERN PHILOSOPHY
On Future Development of the History of Philosophy
CODE
§ = section | p = page | c = column | ¶ = paragraph | s = sentence | w = word | - = counting from the end | Links in grey or sky blue may be unavailable on the Internet
1. JOURNEY IN BEING AND FOUNDATION
JOURNEY IN BEING: CORRECTIONS
Corrections may also distributed among the general comments
No corrections at present
JOURNEY IN BEING AND FOUNDATION: NEW CONCEPT, CONCEPTS, ORGANIZATION AND OUTLINE
The first run through was: 1.26.04 – 2.17.04
OUTLINE
Modifications to the Overall Structure | Foundation | Prologue | Metaphysics | Transformation | Variety | Action
CONTENTS
POSSIBLE MODIFICATIONS TO THE OVERALL STRUCTURE OF JOURNEY IN BEING
Plan. Combine the present document with Journey in Being and Foundation
Free and Bound Elements in Process and in Mind
Truth, falsity; possibility and necessity
The Order of Topics in the Metaphysics
Task. Consider the Overall Structure
Task. Develop Charismatic Format
Plan. Implementing the modifications 2.19.04
Task. Planning the modifications 10.29.03
Top®down, Universal®local, and Universal®personal emphasis
Importance of Presentational Form
Journey in Being is about All Being and Therefore about All Knowledge
Metaphysics is Universal and its Treatment is prior to that of Knowledge
Task. Consider the Logic of the Development
Task. Collect and Consolidate Considerations of Interaction Among the Parts
Task. Therefore, consider multiple arrangements
Task. Change section ‘Human Being’ to ‘Human Being and Community’
The structure of the sections on ‘ethics’ and ‘politics’
Motivation, ‘Excite’ –poetry, language, charisma– especially in the Prologue, Structure
Main Concepts and Points: Logic, Interrelations, Consolidation
Tables of Contents and Locations
Nature of the Personal and Related Issues
How the personal is significant
Consideration of the present version of Journey in Being
Implications of the New Foundations for [Theory of] Being
Task. Placement and Development of Theory
The following considerations arise
Import to Division 1 of Fundamental Theory
Task. Import of Theory from Division 2: Experiments in the Transformation of Being
Preliminary Task. Integrate with Experiments in the Transformation of Being
Theory from the preliminary section
Theory of the Dynamics of Being
Theory of the Variety of Experiments
Task. Import of Theory from Division 3: The Variety of Being
Task. Import of Theory from Division 4: Action and Influence
Plans for the document. After placement
Changes and Additions in the Prologue may also need to be made in the Introduction
… and may also have implications for the main text for Journey in Being
The sense of the following may go to the Prologue, detail to the main text
Horizons and Mileposts | 9.14.03
Improve in the Prologue and in the Main Text of Journey in Being
Meaning of Nothingness | 9.14.03
Logic and Flow of the Prologue | 9.14.03
Use of ‘Being’ in Modern English | 9.14.03
On the Use of Probabilities in Relation to the Void | 9.22.03
On the ‘Local / Universal’ Distinction | 9.28.03
1 POSSIBLE MODIFICATIONS TO DIVISION 1 ON METAPHYSICS OF JOURNEY IN BEING
Plan. Significant distinctions to be maintained
Issue. The Values of Metaphysics, Especially of the Present Kind of Study
1.1 Theory of Being or General Metaphysics
Preliminary: The Place of Epistemology and the Treatment of Knowledge
Treatment of Knowledge Deferred
… and Why the treatment of knowledge is now deferred
The Primary Purpose for Inclusion a Treatment of Knowledge
Preliminary: The Significance of Epistemology
Introduction: Some Thoughts on What ‘Theory of Being’ May Include
As far as possible make the development Universal rather than parochial
On the Approach to Understanding Through the Void | 8.20.03
[More] on Nothingness… and on Law | 9.2.03
The Nature of Nothingness and Possibility; What is Possible is Necessary; Analytic Proof | 1.1.04
Analogy with other Disciplines
Plan for Logic… and Logic & LOGOS
Wittgenstein’s Tractacus. Plan to use in the study of language
The Plan is to Include Mathematics
A Synthetic, Necessary Proposition – ‘What is possible is necessary’ | 10.05.03
Alternate Statements of the Principle of Being | 11.20.03
Task. Analysis of Possibility, Necessity and Logic and Metaphysics | 2.18.03
The Constitution of Being is a Result of its Becoming
The Fundamental Problem of Metaphysics
Planning: Function and Location for the Fundamental Problem
The Logic of the Foundations: Its Development
The Logic of the Foundations: Issues: From “There is no universal law,” anything can be derived
Task. Review logic of the Theory of Being
On Criticism, Construction and the Ultimate |2.1.04
On Criticism – Further Comments; Radical doubt | 11.28.03
1.1.3 Characteristics of Being
Introduction: On Selection and Proof for the Characteristics
Introduction: Kinds of Characteristics – primary, derivative, existential, possible, and fundamental
Plan: A Brief [Re-] Formulation of Fundamental Characteristics
Characteristics and Categories of Being
1.1.3.2 Absence [derivative and perhaps primary]
1.1.3.3 Accessibility and Identity [derivative]
1.1.3.4 Process, change: Time [existential]
Becoming; Being and Becoming; Atomicity
1.1.3.5 Extension: Space [existential]
1.1.3.6 Indeterminacy [derivative]
1.1.3.7 Community and Interactivity [derivative]
1.1.3.8 Meaning [existential and, perhaps with generalization of the meaning of meaning, primary]
1.1.3.10 Experience [existential]
1.1.3.11 Presence [existential and primary]
1.1.3.12 Matter or Material Nature and Other Properties [existential]
1.1.3.13 Actuality [existential and primary]
1.1.3.14 An Infinite Number of Attributes? [possible] [existential – in Cartesian philosophy]
Task. Review Descartes and Spinoza
1.1.3.15 Recurrence [derivative]
1.1.3.16 Fecundity [existential]
1.1.3.17 Good and Evil [existential and perhaps primary]
Ethics Requires an Interplay between and Action of Free and Bound elements
Human Being, Mind and Society; and History
Symbol; Art, Religion, Artifact [Technology]
Task. Develop the Considerations of Ontology. Determine Placement of ‘Ontology’
Plan. Catalog the Distinctions among Categorial Systems
Plan. Criticize the Distinctions among Categorial Systems
Plan. Analyze what First Principles may imply for Categorial System
Plan. Use Archie Bahm’s ‘Introduction to Philosophy’
1.1.5 Entities in Being and Becoming: Brief Characterization
Task. Review content; combine with, especially, Ontology and Human Being
Task. Develop a symbolic calculus for collections of entities on a trt metaphor
On a Mistaken Distinction: Wide and Narrow
[Task. Determine the placement of this section]
1.1.6 The Being of All Being and The Elements of Being
1.1.6.2 The Being of The Elements of Being
1.1.6.3 The Being of All Being
1.1.6.4 The Being of All Being as A Community of The Elements of Being
1.1.7 Existence and Modes of Existence
Issue. Topic to Incorporate: Aristotle [and Others] on Being
Issue. Note or topic to Incorporate: Theory of Being is closely connected with General Cosmology
1.1.8 The Fabric of the Universe
Task. Placement of the parts of this section
1.1.9 The Range and Variety of Being
Task. Placement of the parts of this section
Principles of Articulation of the Variety of Being
A Theory of the Variety of Being?
Task. Placement of the parts of this section
Whitehead and ‘The Human Soul’
Possible topic: The Range of Knowledge
1.1.11 The Possibility of Knowledge and Realization of the Real, of All or of Ultimate Being
Task. Placement of the parts of this section
Task. Review and re-determine titles for the sub-sections for ‘General Cosmology’
1.2.1 Development of the General Cosmology
Task. Review content. Task. Whether and how much to combine with The Theory of Being
1.2.1.1 Outline of a General Cosmology
1.2.1.2 The Categories: Immanent or Imposed
Alternatives to the Immanent and Imposed Interpretations of the Categories
1.2.1.3 A General Metaphysics of Space, Time and Being | 3.8.04
Relativity and quantum mechanics
Prototype pre-quantized theory:
Plan of Development: Developments so far
Plan of Development: Additional Topics
Plan: the Article Time from Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
1.2.2 A Foundation for a Physical Theory of Space-Time-Matter
1.2.2.1 The main ideas for A Foundation of a Physical Theory of Space-Time Matter
Foundation of being and uni-verse in the void or nothingness
Development of the concept of the void
Foundation of being and uni-verse in the void
Notes on the physics of this phase-epoch of the uni-verse and uni-versal law
The nature of the quantum vacuum
What then is the relation of the quantum vacuum to the void?
Origin of the present phase-epoch in the becoming from the void
1.2.2.2 The Philosophy of Time | 9.17.03
Plan: Extend the following to space-time-matter; incorporate into Journey in Being [/outline below]
First, some Principles of Understanding and Explanation
Now, comments on the Philosophy Time and its Place in Cosmology and the Theory of Being
1.2.3.1 Actual and Physical Cosmology
On Cosmology and the Foundations of Physics | 8.20.03
Foundations of Physics | 9.2.03
1.2.3.3.1 Adaptation versus Evolution | 8.2.03
1.2.3.6 Human Being and Human Society
1.3 Mind, Individual or Person and their Metaphysics
1.3.1 The Metaphysics [Nature] of Mind
Some Comments: Mind / Body; and Atomism | 8.29.03
‘Eliminating’ the Concept[s] of Mind | 12.24.03
1.3.3.2 Categories and The Mental Functions
Task. This is the point to include the treatment of mind from the current version
1.3.3.3 On Mental Functions | 8.26.03
1.3.3.4 Additional Areas of Function Needed
1.3.4 A Finite Number of Modalities of Knowing and Being
1.3.5 Other Significant Aspects of Mind
1.3.6 Using the Developments in Mind and Categories to Elaborate and Improve the Treatment of Being
1.3.7 Some Further Topics and Issues
1.3.7.2.1 How to Define the Kinds
1.3.7.4 Side topic: Development
1.3.7.5 Side topic and Application: Mental Disorders and Creativity
1.3.7.6 Problems in the Philosophy of Mind | 9.21.03
1.4 Symbol, Language, Logic and Mathematics
1.4.2 Add Topic: Communication
1.4.3 Using the Developments in Logic to Elaborate and Improve the Treatment of Being
1.4.5 Language and Freedom; concerning natural language
1.4.6 Language and Reality | 10.4.03
1.5.2.2 Gettier Problem and the Nature of Knowledge | 12.24.03
1.5.2.4 Two roles for knowledge
1.5.2.5 Modes, Kinds and Distinctions
1.5.2.6 What is the Status of the Modes, Kinds and Distinctions
1.5.2.7 Two aspects of knowledge
1.5.2.8 Analysis of Belief, Truth and Justification… and of Knowledge
Epistemology Remains Important
Significance of Epistemology and Knowledge
1.5.2.9 On the Synthesis of World and Idea | 12.17.03
1.5.2.11 Knowledge as a form of Being
1.5.2.11.1 Metaphysics and the Possibility of Knowledge and Logic
1.5.2.12 On the Possibility of Knowledge
The Nature of Science | 9.3.03
1.5.2.13 On Platonic Argument | 1.21.04
1.5.3 Possible topic: The Range of Knowledge
A Consideration on Artistic Genius
Possible location for topic: Technology
1.5.4 Using the Developments in Knowledge to Elaborate and Improve the Treatment of Being
1.5.5 Knowledge and its Role in Journey in Being | 9.25.03
1.5.6 Noumenon and Phenomenon, The Problem of. Discussion and Plan | 2.21.04
The Theory of Being in the Analysis of The Problem of the Noumenon
Kantian Synthesis of Knower and Known | 12.8.03
Supplementary Discussion: The Inferred Character of the Noumenon | 11.11.03
Plan. The problem of the noumenon
The Mental Axes: Experience, Attitude and Action | 10.14.04
Revised Mental Axes: Attitude, Idea and Action
On Assumptions in Inductive Inference | 3.1.04
On Presentationism versus Representationism | 10.1.03
On Representational Theories of Consciousness
Plan. This discussion may go to §1.6.6.2 of Journey in Being; see bookmark ‘representation’
1.6 Theory and Approaches to Group Action and Value
Task. Integrate with Social Theory
1.6.1 Ethics; ethics versus Ethics; Axia or Ethics? Organic Unity of Axia, Knowledge and Being
1.6.1.2 Using the Developments in Ethics to Elaborate and Improve the Treatment of Being
1.6.1.3 Are Human Beings Ethical in Nature? | 8.27.03
1.6.2 Political Philosophy and Theory
1.6.2.2 Political Philosophy and Ethics
1.6.2.3 Politics and Ethics | 8.27.03
1.6.2.4 On the Possibility of Theory. Additional comments | 9.11.03
Task. Include: Economics, History, and Law?
1.7 Classical to Current Problems in Metaphysics
On Relations between Philosophy and the ‘Disciplines;’ especially Science | 8.20.03
1.7.1.3 Contemplation and the Value of the Great Questions
1.7.1.4 The Question Does not Exist to which there is no Answer
1.7.2.1 Some Comments on Systematic Metaphysics
1.7.2.2 An Apology for Systematic Metaphysics
Task. Determine where to place Systematic Metaphysics
1.7.3 The Range of Being, Experience and Knowledge
Encyclopaedic Formulations: Britannica
Encyclopaedic Formulations: Modified Britannica
The Modified Britannica System
1.7.4 Possible topic: The Range of Concepts
Task: update the following summary
2 EXPERIMENTS IN THE TRANSFORMATION OF BEING: POSSIBLE MODIFICATIONS AN OUTLINE
Experiments: Nature and Role in Journey in Being
Role of Experiment / Transformation in Journey in Being
2.1 Dynamics of Being and Becoming
Task. Consider the addition of ‘and Becoming’ in the title in Journey in Being
2.2 Classic Systems of Experiment in Transformation of Being
The first set of experiments is in ‘Awareness or Experience’
2.2.1 Perception and Vision-Quest
Task. Consider eliminating ‘and Vision-Quest’ though retaining the material
Task. Consider combining ‘Perception’ and ‘Meditation’ and, possibly, ‘Dreams and Hypnosis’
Task. Documents to review and integrate
Task. Review, incorporate significant ideas from Thich Nhat Hahn The Miracle of Mindfulness, 1975
Task. Consider separating ‘Dreams’ and ‘Hypnosis’
The second set of experiments is in ‘Being’
2.2.4.1 A note on the Yoga of the Bhagavad-Gita
2.2.4.2 A note on the System of the Bhagavad-Gita and Tantra
Task. Consider Alternate Classification to the Distinction: Experience / Becoming
Task. Purposes a section on a ‘System of Experiments,’ separate from the Classic Systems, include
3 THE VARIETY OF BEING: POSSIBLE MODIFICATIONS AND NEW OUTLINE
Task. Consider Possible New Title and Reorganization of Topics
3.2 Actual, Potential and Hypothetical Being; Chain of Being
Plan: Review A. O. Lovejoy’s “The Great Chain of Being”
3.3 Computation and Networking: Theory and Experiment
4 ACTION, CHARISMA, AND HISTORY: POSSIBLE MODIFICATIONS AND NEW OUTLINE
Plan. The following theoretical topics or parts of them may go to Division 1
Plan. Possible New Title and Reorganization of Topics
4.1 Introduction: Purpose and Function
4.2 Action, Influence and Change
4.2.2 The Culture of Fear | 9.28.03
Plan. Here, I note some points unsystematically
The Possibility of Theory i.e. Ideas | 10.7.03
Modern Political Philosophy: Analytic and Continental | 10.11.03
Issue. Adam Smith and Karl Marx – a comparative study
A Note on the ‘Possibility of Theory’ and the despair of Continental Philosophy
Political Philosophy: Two Theories | 10.7.03
Divorce of Politics and Theory
Institution of Integration of Politics and Ideals [and theory]
The Death Penalty as An Example of Ethics, Politics and Rationality
Task. Integrate §4.6.5.3: Political Systems of Journey in Being with The principle of the forms
Plan: Incorporate the principle of the following forms:
4.4 Theaters and Platforms of Influence
4.5 Results, Applications, Plans
Example: The being of an entity is constituted by its becoming
The being of an entity is constituted by its becoming
Variation and selection is the fundamental dynamic of becoming; it is variation or variation and selection; as variation it includes all possibilities; as variation and selection it ‘channels’ realization along stable paths; selection is a phase of variation; it includes the principle of organization from quantum mechanics; and the dynamics of classical physics; it includes Whitehead’s concept of history as ‘force’ and ‘idea;’ it realizes all possibilities potential within the womb of being; and is an expression of that potential from the void; it is the dynamic complement to the resting state of all being outside time or change
[Integrate variation and selection, force and idea into History]
A free organism has both bound and free elements; and, it is this that is required by and that generates ethics, genuine care, knowledge and potency in the world; the becoming [stability, bound] and transformation [free, mutability] requires them to be atomic in both extension and duration: and thus meaning is a project
…somewhat analogous to the distinction bound / free:
fixed / plastic
memory / processing
The different things that are done in being logical; the different notions and concepts of logic; the different ‘kinds’ of logic
Gather, unify
Sources for logic: Journey in Being, History of Western Philosophy and the present document
True, false; possibility, necessity – necessary truth is ‘truth in all possible worlds,’ an idea due to Leibniz
Sources:
Mind in Journey in Being
Cosmology in the present document and in Journey in Being, Philosophy of Time in the present document
…search others
Theory of Being with general concept of mind and knowledge or knowing -> cosmology -> mind -> knowledge -> symbol -> group action; or
Theory of Being with general concept of mind and knowledge or knowing -> cosmology -> mind -> symbol -> knowledge -> group action
Consolidate all material on concepts / slack
Is “slack” the best word to use? Alternates: partially determinate, free / bound, vague, open, fuzzy, fluid, dynamic, evolving
What is it for a concept to be slack? Generally, the idea corresponds to the concept for an object that does not have the concreteness that we usually associate with material objects [but note that even objects that seem concrete are not so – almost regardless of how the metaphor of concreteness is interpreted] and often associate even with non-concrete things such as time, self, government, knowledge and so on. Here are some specific ways in which concepts are slack:
It is not true that all objects either do or do not fall under the concept
It is not true that the concept as understood is validly capable of projection to the universal; in this case it is the ideal concept rather than the actual one that is slack
Not only that meanings are not precise and do not need to be i.e. that [the illusion of] precision is imprecision but also that meanings are unfolding… that a systems of meaning are unfolding and, for Wittgenstein, there is no ultimate clear light at the end of a single tunnel
In various ways of give and play among concepts of a system. Concepts do not exist in isolation from one another or from some framework. Such frameworks may be precise and formal but I am not thinking of precisely defined systems; rather ever ‘theater’ of use constitutes a loosely connected, partially determinate, open ‘system’ where I use quotes to de-emphasize the idea that a system need be systematic. There are, then, a number of ways in which a concept derives slackness from being with in the system: indefiniteness of the system itself –and of its elements– and of its application; and, give and play among the concepts within the system
And, tentatively,
During development of understanding, concepts that may later become precise are allowed slack and this encourages progress toward what precision may obtain
Appropriately understood ‘vague’ concepts are precise
In some ways, it is superfluous to have a Prologue and an Introduction. However, the functions are different: the Prologue is an overview that is intended to present an accessible and brief sketch of the whole picture including the main landmarks; it is intended for all readers – professionals who want an overview before deciding to read the whole work or parts of it and others who may not be interested in or inclined to the lengthy technical development of the main text. The Introduction covers those general and personal motivations for the work, describes those aspects of my development –of My Journey– that are pertinent to The Journey, motivates the structure and contents of the work and points to the locations that the major developments can be found. Thus the Introduction contains the essence of the Prologue and perhaps there is a way to reduce the redundancy
Perhaps there could be two parts… in the following example the titles are tentative: Part I The Elements of A Journey in Being would contain the first two divisions; Part II would be titled Projects in Being, or Applications, or Contributions Toward a Journey in Being and would contain the third and fourth divisions
Another possibility – three documents: 1. Prologue, 2. My Journey – narrative of highlights, the essential ways in which the personal and universal interact; functions also as the introduction, and 3. Journey in Being
Charisma and action; essence, brief, stark, visual, courage… put it out there…
I
speak to you – the individual; I show you life and light
Poetry and simplicity – speaking from and to the core
Brevity | crystal clear logic | bold statement
Force from my person and action
The Journey: Possible! And necessary!
Speaking
directly
to the being of the individual in a way that places him or her immediately,
fully, essentially, and
starkly in the stream of the dynamics of all being
“As
far as knowledge and ideas are concerned, I must again turn away from what
clear light I have seen
and toward intuition and diffuse light to sense and seek what further truth
there may be”
1. Get the main structures down. [a] Outline of the new version of Journey in Being, [b] Structure of the section Characteristics of Being, and [c] Relationship between Theory of Being and subsequent sections of Division 1 [d] continue this list
2. Identify and mark all task and planning points; collect / structure them
3. Before making global change [a] find placement, [b] review literature and sources for ideas, key thinkers, experiments, variety / machines, social action, [c] collect items on the main points, [d] review and improve such main issues as void –> being and underlying logic / language, philosophy of the categories including space-time… [e] continue the list in item d, and [f] do some implementation of Divisions 2 – 4
4. May make corrections, incremental changes as the occasion arises but only if the time needed is moderate
The development of Journey in Being thus far has, significantly been detail / local first; of course not to the exclusion of the universal whose consideration was significantly intuitive in the process but became formal
The approach to subsequent versions must necessarily have a Top-down and Universal-local emphasis; this is what I am doing here but not to the exclusion of details
It is important, however, to not get involved in details until the overview has received sufficient and repeated attention from numerous points of view: new ideas had, the now clear deficits in structure of Journey in Being, the new perspectives from the definitive foundation that –finally– manifested only in the 2003 version of Journey in Being
…and what can be shown but not said
…i.e. what cannot be said in factual language but can be said indirectly by talking around it i.e. e.g. in presentational form
During transition, Journey in Being will be the current version; Journey in Being 7.3.03 will be maintained as a record; a new version of Journey in Being will be established
‘Corrections’ will be made in Journey in Being; and New Ideas will be incorporated to the new version
When the process is complete, Journey in Being and Journey in Being 7.3.03 will be consolidated as ‘old,’ and the new version will replace Journey in Being
Not exclusively, but it is important to keep this point in focus
It has been shown that this is necessary and good; keep this point, too, in focus
Overall: Prologue, Introduction, Main
The phases: and interactions
The sections and subsections: duplication – to remove or retain case by case, placement and order of topics and sub-topics
The anticipation of later sections by earlier ones without circularity
Anticipation of the nature of ‘experience’ and its non-distinction from the actual [material]
Give and take among the parts
That the disjunction into separate considerations [sections] is neither unique nor precise
Topical
Alphabetic
Other: see Evolution and Design and related material for arrangements
This may be separate, may be part of cosmology, may combine with ‘mind’
This has implications for the treatment of ethics and politics and where they go
Where they go
How they interact with other sections such as ‘Theory of Being’, ‘Human Being, Experience and Community’, ‘Life…’
This is very important and a base of communication and advertisement and deserves careful revision: natural and simple with some sections marked as advanced; complete with regard to the main issues; as general as possible
The concepts: being, existence, nothingness or void, knowledge, language, logic, mind, cosmology…
The logic: think it through and clearly state it; whole ® part
Consolidation: at the main logical point; some details at other points as convenient – repetition possible but only when essential
General
Short TOC for prologue at its head?
Add the distinctions: representation versus presentational nature of knowledge; formal versus intuition; innate versus acquired
Make a tree / matrix of kinds of knowledge
‘Journey in Being’ is used in two meanings. One meaning concerns being and its paths from through all its possibilities including the void – and what regularities and accidents constitute the paths: this implies a general theory of being and knowledge and their varieties… make that explicit. In the second meaning ‘Journey in Being’ is an account of my understanding of and experiments in the actual Journey of Being and includes those parts of my personal journey that I deem significant to my success and failure in understanding and experiment
Consolidate the personal story in one place; distribution of information among the personal story, the Prologue and the Introduction
See pertinent places Journey in Being
Variety of paths; contribution to my experience
Persistence, sustenance of belief
My psychology; how it contributes
Reasons to acknowledge motivations; motivation does not invalidate ideas – that appears to be true with regard to content but not with regard to significance of the ideas... however, acknowledgement of motivation makes for awareness of the issue of significance and its evaluation
Significance of straddling academia and the real world; although there is a certain artificiality to the academic world it is nonetheless important and the distinction from the ‘real’ world is also somewhat artificial. What is important is [a] that being at large in the work-economy adds a dimension of experience, of truth, and of connection to the world of the individual – I have experienced its unsheltered aspect; and [b] that the academic world and the work-economy balance one another
The primary sources for Journey in Being are linked in the Site-Map under the heading JOURNEY IN BEING and sub-headings
The Journey in Being has a Prologue, an Introduction, and four main divisions – Division 1, Division 2 and so on: 1. Metaphysics with Theory of Knowledge and Being, 2. Transformations of Being, 3. The Variety of Being, and 4. Action, Charisma and Change. The logic to the organization is as follows. The concept of Journey in Being is that it is an exploration of being in all possible modes. The primary modes are conceptual [Division 1] and experimental [Division 2.] On the assumption that the conceptual exploration is foundational to the system of experiments, the conceptual is placed first. This is of course a simplification for the conceptual and experimental are interactive. Since the exploration is of all possible modes, an attempt has been made to make the first two divisions comprehensive with regard to, at least, the human history of experience in the relevant areas. Thus, Journey of Being, includes an account of the Journey of Human Being in its dimensions of possibility. Additionally, there is an attempt to weave all strands together and, in a personal contribution, to go beyond what has come before; this is in fact the nature and tradition of contributions to the Journey, to civilization or to history. Thus, I have attempted to found, unify, generalize and universalize; in Division 1, one main approach to this is through the theory of the void and its relation to possibility, necessity, being and becoming; in Division 2, a central approach – based in fundamentals and the nature of being rather than merely in ritual or prescription – is what I call The Dynamics of Being. There is some elaboration of the basic ideas and some research projects, plans, ongoing work and results are described in the first two divisions. The future includes a continuation and elaboration of these; and of course ongoing review and – as occasion – modification of the fundamentals. Additionally, Divisions 3 and 4 of Journey in Being are different in nature and scope to the earlier divisions: the two final divisions are [relatively] specialized projects in realization of the earlier divisions – research and experimental projects in aspects of being; additionally, the latter two divisions aspire to be / include both conceptual and practical contributions
The foundation of being[in the void and other considerations below and in Journey in Being has implications for overall concept and structure of Journey in Being and its divisions; some of these are discussed in Journey in Being and some below; this consideration is merely begun: I must further consider and apply what the implications are, what modifications in concept and structure are entailed
In general I will place theory in Division 1; this includes the theory associated with the remaining divisions
The theory of Division 1 should be fundamental and fit together coherently
Some theory may remain in Divisions 2 – 4 when it is clearly connected / interactive with the objectives of those divisions; some repetition may be good
… and integration into and enhancement of the theory [theories] of Division 1
…and reorganization / restructuring of the conceptual basis
…and enhancement of the developments
Especially the sub-sections:
Purpose and Nature of the Experiments
What is a Transformation of Being?
The Value of Transformations of Being
The Discipline of Transformation
…integration into nature of being and experience [mind]
… integration into theory of mind [experience and, more generally, presence and being]
…integration into variety of experience and being
Dynamics: Elaboration of the examples
Becoming: Concept of becoming. Topics: Vision-Quest, of Dreams and Hypnosis, of Yoga and Meditation; Basis in and implications for Nature of Perception and Cognition
Journey: Concept of the Journey – inspiration, vehicle, being and becoming e.g. becoming adapted to a not over-civilized environment – body and perception. Topics: Effect of Journey on Perception, Cognition and Mood; upon Discovery; upon Journey of Being
The System of Experiments: Basis of Variety of Experiments in The Variety of Experience and Becoming
Establish the essentials of the system
Basis and elaboration of the experiments
e.g. the mental functions: perception, cognition, mood and emotion
e.g. the basis and elaboration of the experiments in personality in theory and concepts of personality and personality in being
e.g. experiments in becoming, transformation and arching
Theory of the complete, minimal set
Currently [February 17, 2004]the details of the tasks for Division 3 are in The Variety of Being
Currently [February 17, 2004] the details of the tasks for Division 4 are in Action, Charisma, Influence and Change
[Collect together with all related commentary and with metaphysics lexicon.html and words, language, metaphysics.html]
Observing gender is necessary but becomes cumbersome: he / she, man / woman / human; and poetry is lost
Need: a way to preserve poetry and brevity; and introduce respect
Possibilities: the old German ‘man,’ ‘wo-man,’ and ‘wer-man’ scheme; solution to non-specific gender words he/she, him/her, his/hers – invent words, use e.g. Latin words, or use a randomizing scheme
This new foundation has been germinating as a maturing of the foundation of being in the void established in Journey in Being by July 2003 and was written April – May 2004 in the document foundation
Strengthening the concept of the void; improving the foundation in the void; general consequences from the logic of the void
A new concept of logic that includes the traditional concept; a working out of the concept; showing how the traditional concept of logic fits in
An analysis of the system of ‘Problems of Metaphysics’ to develop a complete set; resolution of the essential problems in terms of the logic: the place and working out of the concept of the absolute idea and the dialectical concept of history; enhancement of the earlier analysis of existence; analysis and solution of the problem of universals and forms; deepening and resolution of what Heidegger called the fundamental problem of metaphysics ‘Why is there something rather than nothing?’…
An approach to the foundation of the understanding of space-time and the foundation of quantum mechanics in the void; this needs to be worked out
Reworking and improving various aspects of my thought and their interconnections: the nature of being and existence; cosmology; the nature of mind and the mind-matter problems; symbol, language, logic, mathematics and knowledge – natures and relationships; ‘The Theory of Group Action and Value’ as a join of aesthetics [ethics] and political philosophy; foundation of the system of experiments including the variety of being, the being of machines, social action
Elaborate the following general and specific plans with considerations from the design, journey and foundation documents
General Plans
Combine the present document, foundation and Journey in Being; abridge to essentials [keep old versions]
Rework the three experimental sections as the work is done; abridge to the essentials [ " ]
Improve and integrate all topics especially those in the above section What’s New: Some Topics
Perhaps incorporate History, History of Western Philosophy and other major documents
Considerations from major experimental-experiential [Yoga, Shamanism, Dynamics and Logic, Mysticism, Exploration, Political Action…] and systems of thought including Indian and Western Philosophy; reworked; implications
Specific Plans
Continue to develop the concept and the formulation of the Journey and its Foundation – the first two sections of foundation
Logic
Cosmology, theory of space-time-being, quantum mechanics
Topics such as knowledge and belief
Collect actual and implied additions and changes from the Prologue
No corrections at present
Further detail for ‘mind’
Articulation and treatment of the twin problems of ‘Physical ¬ ® Mental Causation’ i.e. ‘World/Action ¬ ® Consciousness’
… in listing problems there is, perhaps, one fundamental problem which is the twin problem of: signal ® sense organ ® nerve impulse ® brain and integration ® processing, thought, judgment, decision and will or volition ® unpacking –the reverse of integration– to constituent physical actions ® nerve impulse ® muscle fibers ® physical action
I.e. none other than the classic mind-body problem which includes the problem of mental causation
In Contact: A Novel, 1985, Carl Sagan wrote, “Think of what consciousness feels like, what it feels like at this moment. Does that feel like billions of tiny atoms wiggling in place?”
Of course not. But, what billions of tiny atoms wiggling in place feel is what it feels like. I.e. / in as much as you are those billions of atoms… in the unity that makes them you
This is more or less what is said in Journey in Being
In The Analysis of Matter, 1927, Bertrand Russell suggested that, “In consciousness a fragment of physical reality is being apprehended from within”
Or, conscious is –an aspect of– the apprehension of reality by reality
Or, simply, in mind the real apprehends the real
But this is on the model of relationship or knowledge as distinction… but when relationship is acknowledged as being as in e.g. photons as interactions then, consciousness is –an aspect of– reality
The reality of perception is the perception of the real
The meaning of nothingness; the comments are needed to assert the actual meaning used and to avoid confusion with other use
It is not the nothingness of Sartre which is an existential emptiness
Nor is it physical nothingness… it is especially not the vacuum of quantum physics which results in the absence of things without the absence of laws or the behavior of things
It is an absolute nothingness…
The logic and flow of the prologue is extremely important; for it has the following functions
Introduction, outline, definition and mini-Journey in Being; setting the stage
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First impression
Less technical introduction for general readers
Defining the Journey in Being
One modern use of “being” is that of conscious entity. This is not the use here; rather, the use here is the philosophical sense of to be or exist that has been extensively discussed in the main essay, Journey in Being. Further, the distinction implied by being as a conscious entity is parochial in nature: although this is not, of course, self-evident it the point has been elaborated in the essay
As examples, I talk of the probability of the void manifesting as some state, or I talk of the probability of the void that we consider to be associated with a particle annihilating that particle...
Some times, the use of the concept of probability is valid. The void will manifest as every possible state; the probability is 1. However, what is the probability that the void will annihilate a particle or the current phase-epoch of the universe? In order to annihilate a particle that will have to be done during the lifetime of the particle so it makes sense to ask what is the probability of such annihilation in a given amount of time and I have talked of such probabilities being small…
However, I do not have a basis to make that assertion. Therefore, in order to talk of probabilities something like one of the following is needed:
We agree to use the word probability loosely. This is the most undesirable of the suggestions and is a last resort; it should not be necessary for we could replace “probability” with “ignorance;” and we would then need to distinguish what cases involve ignorance and what cases involve probabilities 0 or1
We would find some underlying logic. This is hinted at in the previous paragraph; this is the most desirable
We would find some datum above the void but below the physical stratum of the object of discussion e.g. a phase-epoch of the universe; this would be satisfactory and valuable but would not be a substitute for the underlying logic of the previous paragraph
Add an emphasis that while it is necessary from the immediate perspective to include a focus on the local, that such focus illustrates and, certainly, does not suppress or diminish the universal; rather the local brings out and supports the universal; and the universal illuminates the local; they are mutually enhancing and supporting. This is consistent with the principle of meaning where an emphasis should be added that, not only are the local and universal both important but they are each empty [or, at least, incomplete] without the other. There is a hierarchy of localizations from phase-epoch of the universe to my immediate here-and-now and even parochial environment. Work out these considerations for the prologue and the main essay
The purposes of the present comment are [1] to ensure that the [discussion or treatment of the] local and the universal support each other rather than be in a detracting relationship, [2] that the narrative encourage clarity on this point, and [3] to separate what is local [though not essentially parochial] and important to human or animal experience or to the experience of an era from what is lasting and universal
Comment on local / universal | 12.2.03: in the Prologue and elsewhere I use the word “our” in relation to the world e.g. “our universe,” “our world” or “our experience.” This rather goes against the distinction between local and universal phases of the narrative and somehow suggests that the local is in fact the universal. A better construction is to refer to the local phase-epoch of the universe or to human or animal experience
Truly, modern knowledge seems to be wonderful in its depth and scope and, especially, its grip on reality. Through modern knowledge, we see the limitations of the past of our civilization and the superstitions of primitives. Modern knowledge penetrates with rigor and reality into the depth of being… But, no: the gap between the deepest knowledge of the theory of space-time and the quantum and its vacuum and the absolute: void is infinite; and, we use our picture, bolstered by our ‘dominant economics’ to evaluate the relativisms and superstitions of others but we have no picture other than ours we cannot get outside it. Our ‘dominant economics’ destroys the world; and our tendency toward positivist vision is crass compared to the awareness of even ‘savages.’ Our knowledge is paper thin in the dimension of being: the shaman binds his being to the being of the cosmos. It must be accepted: however deep we actually go there is below it all a lurking infinity with which all may have some acquaintance by letting go of scientific and ego positivism, by accepting the finitude and the magnitude of our body which is none other than the mind
In the following, ‘Topic’ refers to a main sub-division of the Division under discussion. Distinctions between being as we experience it and all / universal / being or being-as-such are made by referring to being and Being. Similar considerations apply to ethics, knowledge… In the case of being, of course, there is a paradox in distinguishing being from Being since being is the essence of the entity; still there may be a distinction between Being and knowledge of it and there is such a distinction in some metaphysical frameworks but not –essentially– in others
Thing / essence i.e. entity / being; the distinction or its lack
What is the present kind of study? First, a metaphysics at the highest [or lowest] level I can think of – the attempt to understand this phase-epoch of the universe, often taken as the universe, as a speck in the ultimate; then, an attempt to develop this metaphysics and to place all understanding in that context; search for other contexts; systematization as far as is reasonable. Obviously inasmuch as the universe is ‘systematic’ the same has an appropriate place in metaphysics; it is then a problem as to what kind, what, how, and how much system?
The actual value[s] will depend upon the perspective of the individual. I allow ‘value’ to be plural because I do not want to insist on a monistic value system. However, perhaps there is room for monism and again the questions arise: what kind, what, how and how much?
The question of ‘what value’ is not so much a question of what is practical as of perspective although it can be seen as one of practicality
From a ‘practical’ perspective the values would become apparent after or during the study – at least after sufficient thought to reveal what kind of results may be possible. For example, the fact that we can conceive of being part of higher being with ‘pan-awareness’ and we can conceive of, if not fulfilling the possibility of that being, then at least of fulfilling that awareness. Then, much of our struggle becomes moot though not pointless. Thus the awareness may affect choices in a very practical way. It is the practical but not impatient or self-centered person, then, who would want such studies to be undertaken – though it does not follow how much energy ‘should’ be devoted
From the perspective of someone who values ideas, the value of the study is natural. But what is the value of ideas? First, the practical value just noted. Then, the history of ideas is that there is often a significant gap between the idea and its practical fruition – and the connection is often not originally apparent; yet the pursuit of ideas has resulted in so much of what is valued in civilization even by grossly practical persons. Finally, ideas are not flimsy things but connections to all being; this may not appeal to ‘practical’ persons but it is probably the real reason for the appeal to those who value ideas ‘for their own sake’
We see then that the way in which the value in question is held and what value depends on the perspective – especially the immediacy of perspective. For me, all such perspectives are significant in appropriate but not fixed balance. It is only for the impatient and the narcissistic – i.e. individual or cultural narcissists – that there will be ‘no value’ to real metaphysics
In Theory of Being, later results e.g. from cosmology, mind, knowledge… may be anticipated. This is done in such a way as to avoid circularity i.e. the results as abstracted here can be derived independently from general principles – this anticipation, then, is not a logical dependence but is suggested by the later, concrete, development; or, when the present development is derived from facts regarding the later concrete development that are arrived at independently of the present development. I.e. there is a two way logical relation that avoids circularity
The purposes of the anticipation is twofold:
To make the Theory of Being more complete and to have that complete development more efficient as follows, [a] it is not necessary to expose the reader to the iterative development although it is good to be aware of the iteration, and [b] to keep the development in one place
To have the form of the development such that the later developments naturally fit into the scope of the Theory of Being
The deferment refers, primarily, to ‘epistemic’ considerations – the nature of knowledge, nature of and criteria for validity or confidence in knowledge. The content of Division 1 is [part of] the content of human knowledge. Thus, of course, knowledge is present from the beginning; and, thus, a simpler, alternative, title for Division 1 could be ‘Knowledge’ rather than the relatively cumbersome ‘Metaphysics and the Theory of Knowledge.’ In other words, Division 1 is concerned with the Range of Knowledge especially in its most fundamental aspects. In so far as the limitation to ‘human knowledge’ is necessary, it is implied; the reference is allowed to remain tacit for, while truth requires it, truth also requires that its [putative] limit not be overstated...
There is also a place for a definition for the entire range of knowledge; this could be placed in one of the following topics: Theory of Being, Knowledge, or The Problems of Metaphysics
I devoted a number of ‘preliminary’ sections of Division 1 to Knowledge: its nature, the idea of justification – its nature and whether justification would be better replaced by some other concept e.g. one based in analogy to natural evolution such as the ideas of Karl Popper. One original purpose of the considerations on knowledge was to provide a foundation for a Theory of Being. Thus, the sections on knowledge were placed before than those on being
However, the developments showed that the foundation in theory of knowledge was not as crucial as expected
The objective will be to develop the Theory of Being without reference to the nature of knowledge and ‘conditions for validity’ within the domain the reference is unnecessary. Such considerations will shed light on the nature of knowledge which, despite some common views, is not at all given. Then, understanding of the nature of knowledge may be developed which sheds light on the nature of human-animal ‘anchoring’ in the world; one of the points to the development of the understanding of knowledge will be that it is illustrative rather than generative of the anchoring. It is a common view that knowledge is generative and in this guise, knowledge is knowledge-of or knowledge-about the world. However, this view finds a place within the more comprehensive view that knowledge is an adaptation or that it is an interactive phenomenon; which is the root out of which the more discrete-like knowledge as knowledge-of may have grown
As noted elsewhere, the interaction between the development of the general theory of being [metaphysics] and the concept of knowledge may add to each but should be done so as to avoid circularity; which may show up in the form that the general theory has an illicit foundation and may be developed in a form e.g. that is more concrete than warranted
Therefore, I currently plan to begin the division on metaphysics with an account of being and especially the general characteristics of being and its foundation in the void; what reference to knowledge is necessary will be made as the need arise… and, while the topic is important, full treatment will appear later in the division
Why inclusion of considerations of Knowledge remains important
A second, and more important, original purpose to the inclusion of a discussion of knowledge is the intrinsic interest and importance of knowledge. What is knowledge? What are the kinds of knowledge? What is its importance? What is the role of knowledge – science and so on – and symbolic expression in [human] history? What are the extents and limits of human knowledge? What confidence do we have in our knowledge and what is the basis of that confidence? To what extent does human [animal] knowledge form a paradigm for Knowledge in general? What is the relationship between knowledge and being? How may this question be answered? Is there a place for Knowledge at the most abstracted / general / fundamental level of Being? These questions are currently addressed in the preliminary sections of Division 1; they would properly be placed in later sections and, in fact, there is currently a later treatment of some aspects of knowledge. All these considerations will be placed together; that will serve the purposes of unity, coherence, and natural progression of treatment
Since the reaction to the enlightenment that culminated in the critical idealism of Kant, the question of validity or confidence [epistemology] has at least rivaled the question of the content of knowledge [metaphysics.] In Kantian and post-Kantian philosophy, epistemology has often taken center stage; i.e. how we know became more important than what is known. Today, neither epistemology nor metaphysics is fully ascendant and perhaps this is good for the purpose of knowing is not merely to be correct but also to have knowledge
Here, I reverse the post-Kantian trend – of course without claim to be the first to do so. However, I do claim that the reversal here is profound and, at least in its positive statement in terms of fundamental content and depth and proof, perhaps without precedent. It is not necessary to repeat, here, the claim regarding profundity, content, depth and proof
The post-Kantian trend balances the pyramid on its apex
Simply, the reason for the reversal – for placing metaphysics first – is that, even contrary to my initial expectation, epistemology is not necessary to the development. Such epistemological considerations as may assist understanding and address anticipated questions may be given, piecewise, as occasions arise; to this extent the work is naturally unfolding or pedagogical. However, the full development of epistemological issues, as necessary and good, is deferred to the relevant topical sections; to this extent the work is not naturally unfolding. However, to make a work naturally unfolding without exception would make it unnecessarily long and, in the end, counter to the needs of pedagogy. I.e. the needs of understanding require active effort from the reader and, as Arthur Schopenhauer demanded of his readers in the introduction to Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, “no other advice can be given, than to read the book twice.” I allow the later considerations on knowledge [and other topics] to influence the development of the Theory of Being and especially implicitly but have taken care to avoid logical circularity
In the later sections it will be shown that, not only is preliminary treatment of knowledge not necessary but, also, that it should not be preliminary
However, consideration of the how [epistemology] and the nature of knowledge is crucially important from some perspectives; see the section on knowledge
Kant’s philosophy may be seen as having three parts: a critical part – knowledge cannot exceed the bounds of possible experience; an existential statement that within this limit knowledge is possible and actual; and a constructive part – the theory of perception [intuition] and the theory of the synthetic a priori or the theory of understanding that includes logic, mathematics and science
Even within the Kantian framework there has been much advance – in part necessitated by the revolutions that overturned much of what Kant had taken as given and a priori
In the present development the critical aspect of Kant and post-Kantian philosophy is overturned; the existential statement freed from the Kantian limit; and, the constructive aspect modified, accepted and placed within a more encompassing framework
“Kant wanted to prove in a way that would dumbfound the common man that the common man was right: this was the secret joke of his soul. He wrote against the scholars in favor of the common prejudice, but for scholars and not popularly.”
…from Nietzsche’s The Gay Science as translated by Walter Kaufmann
To summarize, the first topic in Division 1 will be Theory of Being and will include, in addition to the topics in the main section on being from the present version of Journey and those in other sections, sub-topics such as What is Being? Can we specify “the being of an entity is what it really is” in a positive or explicit way and must the answering of the question be iterative? Why and how is there being – the fundamental problem of metaphysics? What is the range of being? What is the universe? What is [the essence of] human being? What are the possibilities of being? What is the relationship between what is possible and what is necessary? What forms of being are open to any given being e.g. human being? What forms are accessible and what forms have an access that is feasible and good? How is the access possible? What is the foundation of these questions in the void? What is the relationship between being, matter and mind or experience? Why are these questions interesting or useful to consider? Should the abstract theory of being be placed first? Perhaps not but it is economical to do so and also important in that it is perhaps the fundamental topic and foundational for others; elaboration and understanding come later and, as with any fundamental and interwoven development of interdependent ideas, two readings may be necessary thus making a more pedagogic and less efficient approach less effective
The parochial is important but comes later
Distinguish universal versus local application
[This is 1.1.3 of Journey in Being]
The deepest nature of BEING [and of our being] is un-given
The theory is continued in the following sections on Characteristics of Being, Existence and Modes of Existence, Aristotle on Being and others
Detailed in Journey in Being and elsewhere in this document: see Nothingness et. Seq. and related sections
[The first application being to the general theory of Being]
An approach through which any culture, civilization or age can embed its special forms of knowledge, art, science, religion and magic in the absolute and the universal
A way of seeing or showing / an intermediate device to see or show that all / almost all actual laws and forms of being are contingent even if most interesting and most relevant to the phase-epoch of the universe… for any system of laws for a datum from the present phase-epoch of the universe, there is an infinity of other laws that agree on the datum but that are wildly different outside the datum and that includes being outside the phase-epoch. Thus, foundation in the void, too, is supported by some of the laws. This is a trivialization and is by no means a justification of the theory of the void including the principle of identity whose justification is otherwise
Laws as objects e.g. in defining the quantum vacuum as what is left when objects are [conceptually] taken away, the richness that results is due to not taking away quantum behavior [laws] itself…
If a miracle is an exception to the laws of the present phase-epoch of the universe, the present cosmic epoch, then miracles are possible; this is an obvious consequence of the nature of the void and its equivalences
Relative to ALL BEING º THE VOID, there is no miracle; there is not only an absence of any ‘need’ but also no concept of the miraculous – for, relative to ALL BEING there is nothing exceptional, nothing transcendent. ALL BEING includes anything that might be labeled miraculous as common place. But the miraculous is not at all common place to individuals in a cosmic epoch which is infinitesimal in comparison to ALL BEING
What word should I use: void, nothing, nothingness, emptiness…? [see Words, Language, Metaphysics]
It is important that nothingness not be understood, merely, as the absence of things. For, if things are absent, it may seem that laws are still present – reflection may show the idea to be absurd – waiting to apply to anything that were placed in the void
However, what is a law? A law – in science and physics – is not something over and above the being of the entities of the universe. A law is not something that the entities of the universe “obey” or even follow even though we may see it that way with much good effect in use and application of the laws. A law is part of the being of the world or universe – or of a phase-epoch thereof – as much as is the material nature of being. A more accurate statement is that a law is part of our expression or formulation of the being of the world – of the patterns of being and becoming. Thus, “taking away” the matter of the universe [phase-epoch] does not leave the laws behind. This explains what I have said elsewhere [e.g. here] regarding “taking away” i.e. that the laws, too, must be eliminated for there to be nothingness. We think, sometimes, of laws as artifactual but they are not. True, laws and theories are overturned and therefore seem artifactual but it is not the true laws that are artifactual in this sense but only our expression of them
We have been talking, then, of law as immanent versus law as imposed
But, here in the Theory of Being and the Void, we go beyond that distinction. There is no universal law; there are laws of this or that phase-epoch or other distinction of the uni-verse. Out of the void comes a ‘coherent’ phase-epoch where law is its coherence; is that law immanent – for that distinction it would seem so; but, it does not project beyond the phase or beyond the epoch and thus has an imposed character: our expression of the law will have an approximate and imposed aspect within the phase-epoch and when projected beyond the phase-epoch it would be not only imposed but wrongly so. However, in considering the origin of a phase-epoch, its laws may co-evolve with its elements i.e. immanent; or its laws may be a [partial] function of the rest of the universe i.e. have an imposed character [even if not exclusively so]
General comments | 11.20.03: Still more on the void
The Void = ‘emptiness’ = ‘without differentiation’
1. Consider N = Nothingness, S = some state of being, and E = eternal everything. To say [A] that N must transform into S is in contradiction of the idea of N. The contradiction is not that N will become S but that it must. What if S is N itself or, better, ~E? Then, that N must transform into S means that N will remain N which is a violation or contradiction of the concept of nothingness. I.e. N will become something – sometimes and immanently rather than compulsively and eternally
2. [In the following, N +> S reads ‘N will not transform to S;’ similarly N -> S reads ‘N will transform to state S;’ C[N] reads ‘the concept of N;’ and => reads ‘implies.’] Consider N +> S; this violates C[N]. But ~[N -> S] => N +> S; therefore ~~[N -> S] which => N -> S; i.e. for every possible [e.g. imaginable [without contradiction] state] S, N -> S
3. There is an obvious logical contradiction above that raises questions about logic or its application – or applicability in as much as it is implied that the raw idea of N contains contradiction
4. What is N? It is not empty space but space-less-ness. It is not the quantum vacuum which contains quantum laws or quantum like behavior and is therefore not N. It is not and does not contain LAW [of which our expression is law] or CAUSE or PATTERN for the presence of any of these contradict C[N.] Law, cause, pattern, extension, duration are not distinct from thing and it is not possible [logically] to take away things and leave behind law, cause and the rest; when all things are removed, the quantum vacuum does not remain – nor even the classical vacuum which is so much less than the quantum vacuum
5. Regarding the foregoing concern about a logical contradiction there was an equal concern as to the applicability of logic to N. The previous points will directly show that the latter equivalent concerns are paramount
6. We simply say that since N admits not only nothing but also of no necessity [law, pattern…] that from N, every S [whose description is without contradiction – it seems impossible to imagine an object that is entirely green and entirely red simultaneously but it is easy to describe one] must be possible. But in the one universe the only measure of possibility is actuality and therefore every non-contradictory S will occur. [The other meaning of possibility that something ‘could’ occur implies a population of worlds of which this world is one; and the idea of such a population contradicts the idea of the one universe which has been shown to be necessary]
7. Most generally, since N, from its definition, co-exists with the universe [and equally with all of its elements] the one universe will [with a little logic be seen to] phase in between N and S
8. The meaning for analyticity is [1] performed in a vacuum of actual things, entirely symbolic logic is empty; and, [2] the conditions of analyticity and logic are never finally determined but evolve together with their application
1. The concept of nothing is not the same as that of no thing
2. ‘No thing’ is both green and red. This does not mean that nothing is both green and red or green or red. The point is that green and red are ‘contraries’ and it is for this reason that the idea of nothing as that for which contraries –the concept of Peirce– are true is not the present idea of nothing
3. It is true that if I think of a meaning of ‘nothing’ as a compound of its roots I find that nothing is green and red
4. But if I think of nothing as an elementary term then ‘nothing is green and red’ does not follow
5. The difficulty is with the idea of thing by which we usually mean some actual [e.g. material] thing
6. The idea of ‘nothing’ that I want to grasp is the idea of what remains when all things are removed – not just every thing in some specialized or reduced meaning of thing. This problem with ‘thing-hood’ is part of the problem of the secularization of language; it leads not only to metaphysical poverty and, so, for a metaphysical / linguistic animal to actual poverty
7. The concept of ‘nothing’ in #6 is not the same as in #3 or of ‘no-thing;’ but if we disallow the truncated meaning of ‘thing,’ no thing and nothing come closer in meaning
8. It is no-thing, the nothing of #3 or ‘not a thing’ that is the literal meaning of the nothing of #3 that satisfies the concept of nothing of Peirce as that which possesses contrary attributes
9. I.e. the nothing of #3 can be red and green, here and there, can exist and not exist even as a classical “ ”
10.
“ ”
“ ” “ ”
“ ” “ ” “ ”
…
11. If nothing #3 exists no-thing exists
12. Nothing #3 is not a well formed concept
13. #6 is the concept of nothing that I use
Logic is the science of the possible, or
Logic is the science of possible states of affairs
Science – the term is not important, do not be derailed by it; alternative terms for ‘science of’ are ‘study of,’ ‘way of determining,’ ‘art of determining’
States of affairs – here and in the following, in this section on logic, ‘states of affairs’ may be abbreviated to ‘states’
When logic is so conceived, language is a chapter in logic
Actual, potential, relation to ‘necessity,’ the seeing, sacred and profane, esoteric and mundane, the awful and the mysterious; states of experiencing – attitude and action… idea and will; relation to language and its ‘unending’ variety of use
While logic is the art of determining what is possible… Dynamics is the art of the possible
I.e. dynamics is the art of actualizing or creating what is possible; or, dynamics is identical to the Dynamics of Being and Becoming
Whereas physics is the science or study or determination of possible physical states of affairs in this phase-epoch of the universe, logic is –simply– the study of possible states
A typical problem in physics: given some conditions i.e. information about the actual physical states in this phase-epoch of the universe and under its laws, to determine further data about actual physical states
Similar analogies with other disciplines are possible, see Mathematics and The Disciplines
Determine all possible states consistent with some facts or conditions regarding the states
Determine all possible states – seemingly a particular case of the previous problem for it can be formulated ‘Determine all possible states consistent with no conditions;’ however, given all possible states, it is possible, in principle, to map out territories corresponding to various conditions
An example of a proposition is, ‘It is raining.’ ‘It is raining,’ ‘It is true that it is raining,’ and ‘‘It is raining’ is true,’ are all propositions and have the same meaning. ‘Come here,’ ‘What is that?’ are not propositions [though ‘I said ‘What is that?’’ is one]
‘It is raining’ is an assertion that a certain state of affairs obtains. If every ‘picture’ of the world could be described in language or linguistically expressed i.e. in a sentence, then every assertion that a state of affairs obtains could be expressed in a sentence. We could then say that a proposition is an assertory sentence. In absence of the knowledge that every ‘picture’ has an [equivalent] linguistic expression, we should go on the assumption that not all assertions that states of affairs obtain can be explicitly stated in sentences
A proposition is the assertion that a state of affairs obtains
If ‘A’ is a possible state of affairs, then ‘A obtains’ is a proposition. Thus all propositions can be expressed in sentences but the expression may not be explicit
The proposition ‘A obtains’ may be abbreviated, as is natural in natural language, as ‘A.’ Provided care is taken, this will not lead to confusion
It is common and convenient to let the letters ‘p,’ ‘q,’ ‘r,’ ‘s,’ and so on stand for propositions
A proposition expressed as an explicit sentence may be called a sentential proposition. If it is the case that all states of affairs can be described in sentences, all propositions could be expressed as [explicit] sentential propositions. This depends upon whether there is a ‘picture’ for all states and what is language; in some meanings, ‘description in language’ and ‘picture’ are identical. At present I make no assertion about the equivalence of ‘picture’ and ‘description.’ And I make no assumption regarding ‘picturability.’ Thus I leave the definition of ‘proposition’ in its general form; the understanding remains that some propositions can be expressed explicitly in sentences and that, on assumptions just stated, all propositions will be [expressible as] sentential propositions
A proposition true if the asserted state of affairs actually obtains; otherwise it is false
A proposition cannot assert of itself that it is true [Wittgenstein] for, then, there would be no state of affairs whose obtaining could be asserted
If the truth of p entails the truth of q i.e. if q is always true when p is true then the truth of p is said to imply the truth of q. This may be abbreviated as ‘p implies q ’ or in symbols ‘p Þ q,’ or ‘p É q ’
An example of ‘logical implication’ is: ‘p & q É p ’
An example of ‘material implication’ is: ‘given p and (p É q) then (p É q) É q ’
The distinction between logical and material implication is not fundamental but subsists in the manner of statement; the two are given as examples: in the first case of implication where the premise contains the conclusion or logical implication; and the second where some material fact ‘p’ and a law ‘p É q ’ are given and another material fact is deduced. The significance of ‘logical’ implication, the tautology, is threefold: the concept, the use in long chains of derivation, and that complex tautologies are not obvious even though trivial
For a system of the propositional calculus, see Kinds of Knowledge; which contains the following cases where propositions have form: the categorical propositions, the syllogism, and the predicate calculi
Complete the foundation; elaborate up to a certain point of adequacy
The notions of state of affairs, possible state, obtain, picture, picturability, describable, language, sentence, proposition, sentential proposition, truth
Relation to the traditional view which is what is left over when the special disciplines i.e. of this phase-epoch of the universe [this world] are subtracted out of the science of the possible which =? what is possible in any phase-epoch [any world] =? the science of relations among truths…
The possibility of states of affairs is an ‘assumption’ behind the possibility of propositions and truth; this leads to the possibility of propositional logic
Systems of logic: propositional calculus…
Elaborate the systems especially the propositional calculus and its derivatives e.g. the categorical propositions, the syllogism and the predicate calculi i.e. re-found the systems in Kinds of Knowledge
Clear up some distinctions
Confusions of ‘A’ standing for ‘A obtains,’ propositions [sentences] A, B, C… vs. propositional variables p, q, r, s…
Also see logos1, logos2, and logos3; if logic is the study of the possible, the world it studies is LOGOS – especially its forms
…and logic1 [Analysis of Possibility, Necessity and Logic and Metaphysics,] logic2, logic3 [Metaphysics and the Possibility of Knowledge and Logic,] logic4, logic5, logic6, logic7
…is obviously in the ‘background;’ develop its use, avoiding its limitations e.g. those pointed out by Wittgenstein himself including the ‘later’ Wittgenstein of especially Philosophical Investigations
Even if the detailed foundation, e.g. picture-reality isomorphism, is not valid, the idea of picture-reality relation and the thought that all language forms [games] bear some relation –to even if not propositional– and are in reality is significant. Further the idea –from speech act theory– that every linguistic form is some combination of illocutionary force and propositional content is important; and its validity is very much worth considering; additionally the generalization from propositions to propositional attitudes –considered in the Tractacus– is useful in attempting to bring language under a propositional umbrella. This is not at all necessarily a reduction but rather an expansion of the idea of ‘proposition’ together with the idea of an analysis of ‘what is language’
Now, Wittgenstein might have difficulty with the variety of language games but where has he demonstrated that the idea of the proposition cannot be generalized as suggested in the previous paragraph?
Nature of mathematics especially in consideration of the above, the theory of mathematics and its relation to logic and form developed elsewhere in Journey in Being, the present and related documents; and the ideas Frege, Russell, Hilbert, Brouwer, and Wittgenstein
Mathematics are the branches of logic in which mathematical systems are elaborated and their theorems deduced; this does not define the nature of mathematics any more than did the previous item define geometry. We should look to mathematics to characterize it e.g. mathematics is the study of form and structure or mathematics is the study of invariants under classes of transformations… The ‘definition’ here would appear to support the Logicism of Frege and Russell but this is not so for the logicist thesis requires that no new axioms or terms be supplemented to those of logic; and it would appear to exclude intuitionism but this is not so for there is also an intuitionist interpretation of logic which yields intuitionist mathematics by the addition of mathematical intuition
Physics is the branch of logic in which the laws, theories, conventions and other considerations of physics hold
Geometry is the branch of logic in which the axioms of geometry apply to geometrical concepts introduced as undefined terms
Common sense is the branch of logic of everyday life
None of these pseudo-definitions is an actual definition; the objective was to show the pervasiveness of logic
The ‘definition’ of physics was more applicable to its subject for it said something material and physics is a science of the world
The significance is twofold:
That What is possible is necessary is significant – generally, and in establishing the Principle of Being of Journey in Being. Alternately, What is not a logical contradiction or what can be described is possible. Here, ‘can be described’ implies that an inconsistent description is not a description e.g. ‘The bird that is completely black and is also completely blue’ is not a description
That there is some significant, necessary proposition is also significant for it might seem that the only necessary propositions are analytic
The analysis follows
1. There is a synthetic, necessary proposition
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Take an analytic proposition to be one whose truth-value follows from its meaning; this covers both subject-predicate and possible worlds formulations of analyticity. A synthetic proposition is one that is not analytic and therefore proposition statements are either synthetic or analytic Thus ‘All ravens are birds,’ ‘Ravens are eagles,’ and ‘This sentence is false,’ are all analytic. The first sentence is true, the second is false – it is assumed that ‘raven’ and ‘eagle’ are defined so that no eagles are ravens, and the third is neither true nor false – G. Spencer Brown, Laws of Form, 1972, would call it “imaginary” A necessary proposition is one that is true under all possible circumstances or, alternately, in all possible worlds; a contingent proposition is defined as one that is not necessary and therefore holds only in some circumstances. True analytic propositions are necessary and thus it may be supposed that the only necessary propositions are analytic ‘All ravens are birds’ is necessary but, in contrast, ‘All ravens are black’ is contingent because it holds in some circumstances e.g. a world in which all ravens are black Consider: |
[A] |
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‘The only necessary propositions are analytic’ The statement [B] is either true or false. It will be shown that [1] follows from the truth as well as from the falsity of [B] and, therefore, [1] must be true If [B] is false then [1] follows from [A] If [B] is true, it follows that there are no universal laws. Therefore anything that is possible is necessary or else there would be a law prohibiting it |
[B] |
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Therefore all possibilities will be realized [actualized] in the one world [universe.] Alternatively, ‘What is possible is necessary’ The proposition [C] is clearly synthetic whose necessity follows from the truth of [B] This completes the demonstration of [1] |
[C] |
2. What is possible is necessary!
Since there is and can be only one world, the only possible measure of possibility is actuality and, so what is possible is necessary. On this necessary view, that what is possible is necessary is a tautology
There is an apparent contradiction. ‘What is possible is necessary’ appears to be synthetic but its truth follows from the meaning of ‘possible.’ The resolution is that in a ‘floppy’ view of reality [many worlds are possible,] ‘possible’ has a ‘floppy’ meaning according to which [C] is synthetic. However, on a proper view of reality, the true meaning of ‘possible’ is revealed and [C] is analytic and necessarily true. Further that there is a synthetic, necessary proposition has been demonstrated only on assumption of the floppy meaning of ‘possible’
Thus [C] is synthetic and necessary on the floppy metaphysics but analytic and necessary on the real metaphysics. The proposition is logical and factual on both metaphysics
3. The [con-]fusion of the analytic and synthetic is implicit in the Principle of Being [of Journey in Being] and the logic of the void and begins to occur at this level of generality. Is a statement analytic… or is it more correct to say that it is analytic-over-a-universe-of-discourse? At the general level, [C] is analytic and factual
4. The [my] original reason for considering [B] is that it is an analytically expressed equivalent to the Principle of the Void i.e. that the void is equivalent to every state of being. This equivalence, which I felt to be true, has been demonstrated – it is precisely what has been proved
5. Task. Incorporate to Journey in Being: logic of the void. Possible: make a new section ‘for logicians and metaphysicians’ in JIB and its prologue. Generally upgrade the discussion of analyticity etc. especially in footnote 32 of JIB. Possibly include an additional distinction: universal versus existential
The following are equivalent [which follows from reasoning in Journey in Being and in A Synthetic, Necessary Proposition:]
The void [nothingness] is equivalent to every being
Every being is equivalent to all being
What is possible is necessary
What is not a logical contradiction, what can be described is possible
There are no universal laws i.e. there are no laws e.g. ‘laws’ of physics laws of this phase-epoch but not laws of the uni-verse i.e. not laws per se
The previous section suggests the following lines of inquiry:
Different meanings of possibility and necessity: including material versus logical; and relationships between possibility and necessity. E.g. in ‘if an event is possible it is necessary’ means [on a many worlds metaphysics] that if it is possible it will occur in some world or [on a one universe metaphysics] that if it is possible it will occur [with eternal return and, additionally, is occurring in infinitely many places]
And, as suggested by the previous paragraph, that logic and the analytic-synthetic distinction can depend on metaphysics
…obviously
Alfred North Whitehead in Process and Reality, 1929, p. 23 of the 1978 Free Press Edition: from Category of Explanation (ix), “That how an actual entity becomes constitutes what that actual entity is; so that the two descriptions of an actual entity are not independent. Its ‘being’ is constituted by its ‘becoming.’ This is the ‘principle of process.’ ”
Buddha, “You are a result of all that you have thought”
[The link points to the document]
The traditional fundamental problem has been Why does anything exist? I.e. rather than nothing. But this problem has been rendered trivial by the foundation in the void i.e. ‘nothingness’
Therefore, asks What is the fundamental problem of metaphysics?
Argues that the fundamental problem is Why is there presence? I.e. Why is the universe present to itself in the sense of awareness or conscious experience of itself [as when one part of it – a sentient being – is aware of some part of it]
The response, in brief, is the same! Or, in elaboration, given sentience we know its possibility; or, existentially, the universe contains the possibility of sentience… and therefore must
And, again, the argument must be that some universe will contain sentience but rather, that, there will always be phase-epochs of this universe that is the one uni-verse that contains sentience [and in the generalized meaning presence is present to itself]
But according to the argument from the void, even though we know of the conceivability from the possibility we do not need to use the possibility; conceivability is enough
I.e. the deepest problem is the most trivial. The analytic depth consists in seeing the triviality behind the screen of metaphysical confusion and the profusion of being, life and ‘science.’ Science in quotes because, here, it connotes the profusion of factual and conceptual information regarding our phase of the universe
It is life that presents ‘truly difficult’ problems; and this is, partly, the wonder of this being
Careful development of the logic – fundamental and perhaps difficult problem whose difficulties are not an indication of an imperative to reject the theory but to question both the theory and the nature of description and logic
Carefully analyze the meaning, logic and implications of the statement that “There is no universal law”
Analyze the possibility for elimination of paradox; how may one deal with “essential paradox” i.e. the idea that paradox cannot be eliminated from any attempt at full understanding: minimizing contradiction, positive versus negative law
Distinguish sources and placement of related reasoning: [1] existential and [2] theoretical – including theory of the void
Note the recent development 3.4.04: On Logic
It is a consequence of some serious critical points of view, when taken to the extreme i.e. when regarded with purity e.g. the in the style of Wittgenstein as in Philosophical Investigations, 1953, that positive philosophy is impossible. The details could be spelled out: just as that, given the foundation in indeterminism from the void, being is open – what has been seen concretely by a concrete individual or collection is not a clue to the entire range of concrete possibility – so, knowledge is never final. Of course every absolute contains its own contradiction; thus some forms of knowledge are final and this includes the non-finality of knowledge. But we want to focus on the absolute non-finality. And, in consequence of the openness of being, there is a similar openness of knowledge… and similarly, also of language. And, further, while the openness of knowledge and language follow from the very nature of being they also follow from the incompleteness of our particular being for this limit would be experienced even before the openness of being came into question or were experienced. And so the critical points of view e.g. of Kant and of Wittgenstein
Is this all we can say?
What of the great constructions of science does not their very success –the way in which a Newton, a Maxwell, or an Einstein has that epiphany of system that suddenly sheds light, that brings entire worlds of phenomena in from the darkness of ignorance to the light of clear understanding– does this not address the possibility of positive –i.e. actual but not at all in the sense of logical positivism– construction? For each light of understanding, however, there is also a shadow world which we do not see especially because it is not in the beam of the light. We do not see it because it is not illuminated and not because it is not there. That is in the nature of the great encompassing theories. But a more sane view i.e. more sane than either the great critical ‘systems’ or the great constructive ones when viewed as ultimate is, in analogy again to the becoming, that the actual is on the border between the concrete and the potential
And, more to the point, the great Theory of Being of the Journey. Follow the train of thought just a short way. The void is the absence of ‘everything.’ That is almost a contradiction for it seems to imply that in the void there is also the absence of absence. Such contradictions have been dealt with in Journey in the analysis of the concepts of ‘everything’ and so on. In the void there can be no LAW for LAW is not nothing; the void cannot remain forever empty for that would be a PATTERN or LAW. Paradox can be removed in analysis but paradox remains. But in accepting this we accept also, in our incompleteness, our reaching for BEING. I.e. the acceptance by accepting the possibility of paradox is the grasp of the ultimate in the finite. Think it through: paradox is the shaking of the foundations the crumbling of the system but the positive inversion is that through accepting paradox we also accept infinity; or, given the correspondence between paradox and in the destruction of thought and death as destruction of the concrete individual: in accepting our death and ruin we become open to the ultimate. The building of empires [civilizations] that would last forever is empty; so for empires of thought [metaphysics;] but we continue to build civilizations without which the criticism of a Wittgenstein would never come to be: it is the antithesis of Wittgenstein that makes Wittgenstein possible and it is his charisma that makes for generations of sycophantic followers as much as the real penetration of his thought; we build metaphysics even while we know the foundation is insecure and this is true for every building, every being and every individual. Every paradox can be resolved or leads to a ‘shaking of the foundations’ that is an opening to reality, to becoming. Paradox is paradise lost but ‘paradise lost is paradise regained’
And, again: based upon an historical view of either being [evolution] or ideas [hypothesis-deduction-correction or, simply, selectionism] we may conclude that there is no absolute in being or knowledge or that even if there ‘is’ it is unattainable. However, this is based upon history and has contingency but not necessity and in no way at all does it rule out the possibility of the absolute-ultimate or its un-attainability. It may be attainable within the scope of the present argument and as shown in Journey in Being all being is accessible to every being. It is further of interest that ‘evolutionary epistemology’ has come under criticism in philosophical circles because it does not give ‘timeless results.’ This is an incredibly self-serving and ignorant view: it is exactly the way in which knowledge is attained in any field; the approach to the timeless need not be timeless and since knowledge does not spring from some fountain in its full maturity the approach must often be through the temporal to the timeless
Think of everyday life – yours or mine or that of an individual of another species; this is not other than the esoteric including science. Knowledge is a part of this: where is the best grass, why grass not rocks, estimating the width and depth and turbulence of a stream to decide whether to ford it; and conceptual knowledge
Everything can be in error but at the same time if all knowing were unfaithful, knowing would not have arisen. I.e. error and faith on the one hand and knowledge on the other are at one level categorically distinct; at the level the appropriate category of knowledge is adaptation and the relevant particular is ‘sufficient adaptation.’ Fact and error lie within the same categorial field; but, in essence i.e. at an appropriate level, knowledge is in a different field of which there is a sub-field that is isomorphic to the field of fact
To repeat, if everything is in error knowledge cannot arise
Therefore, radical doubt cannot be a way of life; it is at most an acquired system of belief which the radical doubter abandons in the gloom of his own mind. As a make believe way of life, radical doubt is an ego-clout – an arrested stage of development. Radical doubt receives a form of resolution from Kant who first accepts it and then shows it to be the fabric of knowledge and not ignorance
True radical doubt is a phase of knowledge; it is neither beginning nor end. From the fact that every element of knowledge may be subject to criticism, it does not follow that there is no knowledge. Adaptation is the categorial field of knowledge but not precision or certainty; the latter are adjunct values in the categorial field
But still, criticism is essential in the conceptual-factual process of knowing:
To improve degree of confidence; this is the category in which certainty lies
Advance
Distinguishing obvious falsehoods; dogma
On the Possibility of Science and on the Origin of Dynamics: “in the beginning” there is the void where there is no causation, no pattern, no law, and no necessity other than logical necessity. Then: the chaotic and fluctuating origin of being. The requirements for more than transient existence are: [1] becoming which means that absolute stability is not possible for absolute stability allows no becoming or decaying or change; [2] symmetry for sufficient stability but, by the foregoing, not absolute symmetry. The requirements for variety include an interactive population of “elements” i.e. a system of particles in interaction or, in other words, a field with singularities. Note, of course, the non-distinction between the particle-field and field-singularity descriptions; and also note that “particle” can be replaced by “concentration” and by m-dimensional manifold, m < n, in n-space. Elementary dynamics is possible due to lack of complete symmetry: dynamics is created in origins. Aggregate dynamics is possible due to interactivity of the populations and is just elementary dynamics for populations; this since the interactivity is created in origins. However, this makes clear that the aggregate and the elementary are distinct only for certain purposes that are local even within a phase-epoch. In the foregoing lie the origin of physics and a hint about the possibility of mathematical description of physics [symmetry and its incompleteness.] With sufficient variety, structure may be built upon structure; here lies a hint about the descriptive and conceptual rather than mathematical nature of biology; of course, the distinction is not complete and the possibility of a fundamentally mathematical biology or social science is not excluded by the argument. The origin and creation of time: I have used this paradox like phrase before; however there is no paradox: the details of the discussion are in Journey in Being. There are multiple transient times associated with every elementary instance of manifestation from the void; when a stable, interacting population occurs it has or may have a single dominant time in its phase. This does not mean that there are no other times but that they are vastly subordinate. If the unitary aspect of a phase-epoch spreads it may subsume the transient times of the shadow existence at the borders. What of two phase-epochs, each with its own time? That appears to contain the seeds of paradox but it does not for the two phases may interact weakly or even if they do not there is the potential to interact at some future time; and if they do not then each phase-epoch has no relative existence for the other
On the Effectiveness of Mathematics: mathematics is the science of structure; effective mathematics will be about basic structure while mathematics of complex structures will be possible but not necessary [to finite minds.] Fundamental structures are symmetric; hence the effectiveness of mathematics in the elementary structures of nature i.e. in physics. Recall, here, Wittgenstein’s comment that form is the possibility of structure; and, from Journey in Being, Logos is the science of possibility or, alternately, the collection of all forms; mathematics is a symbolic but incomplete representation and the universe [being] an actualization of Logos
It is not necessary to posit a separate world – LOGOS; but if it that is done then realize that LOGOS is omnipresent like the void
Being exists, is what is – as it is; the being of an entity is ‘what it truly is.’ This ‘algebraic’ approach is ‘solved’ below
That being exists implies that the being of an entity is ‘what it truly is.’ How? Since any being can be expressed b = Σ bj where all bj exist i.e. existence implies constitution
Power – in Sophist, Plato says, “and I hold that the definition of being is simply power.” Plato explained power as the ability to affect something else. This idea leads as above to the idea of disjunct universes such that any object in a universe can affect any other object in the same universe but cannot affect any object in another universe. As before, we conclude that there is only one uni-verse and every object can affect every other object.
A discussion of all being would be appropriate here but is deferred to The Being of All Being and The Elements of Being
The elements and characteristics are not a priori given to us. They are to be discovered. In some measure we know being in our inner being [body;] difficulties arise because discovery is possible the mode of clear description and rationality
Distinguish what is true of all being and what is true of some beings; all being exists, some being is material…
Here, when later developments are anticipated, the dependence is sufficiently abstract or general to avoid circularity
The ‘logic’ is in two parts: choice of the characteristics and proofs
Two considerations govern the choice:
Characteristics that bring out and elaborate the nature of being and the void e.g. the derivative characteristics [below]
Characteristics that anticipate the structure of the present phase-epoch of the universe and our world e.g. the existential characteristics that anticipate: cosmology; life; human being, experience and society
While care is taken to avoid circularity, there is a give and take between developing an understanding of being and the understanding of this world; this mutual process heightens the significance and improves understanding of both. As an example, the selection and understanding of the characteristics below may develop in interaction with The Range of Being, Experience and Knowledge and associated encyclopaedic formulations
The proofs are trivial consequences of, equivalently:
The properties of the void or nothingness
That there is no universal law
What is possible is necessary; if a thought does not involve a logical contradiction it is possible
While these principles are my re-discovery, they are not new and were familiar to travelers in remote continents of ideas and especially to Leibniz who also subscribed to the idea that what does not involve a logical contradiction is actually possible. The full articulation and strength of the ideas is, I believe, new with my work
While the propositions have absolute truth, remember that such truth may be remote e.g. while all being is accessible to every human being the access is ‘normally’ colossally remote
Example:
The characteristic of community / universal-interactivity follows from the NO-LAW property of being [i.e. of nothingness.] Show that non-interaction would be LAWLIKE [alternatively, devoid of meaning] whereas interaction is a realization of possibility
For any two objects, their interaction is a logical impossibility only if they are in ‘distinct, non-interacting universes.’ For, if two objects cannot interact it immediately follows that there must be at least N systems of objects, N > 1, such that no object of any of the systems in question can interact with any object of any other system and the two original objects are not in the same system. But each of these systems constitutes a separate universe. And as we have seen there is effectively one universe of being which is the one universe or the uni-verse
Therefore we may say that for any two objects in the uni-verse there is a possibility of their interaction – for, unless it is logically impossible, it is possible; and that they will interact in some phase of the one universe. Or, any two objects can and will interact: Being Forms a Community
Complete this for other characteristics
Primary: existence itself and, perhaps, absence and presence and good and evil
Derivative – deriving from the primary: e.g. absence, accessibility, identity, indeterminacy, community, recurrence
Existential – deriving from the world-as-we-know-it: time, space, meaning, experience, presence, matter, mind, good and evil; these are characteristic of some being but, without showing it, are tentative for all being. Although presence is derivative, it is a ‘generalization’ of experience and this brings it closer to being a characteristic of all being: all being above a certain level is present to the universe – at least to the local environment; some higher being is present to all being; and all being including ‘lower’ being is present by the argument for community / interaction
Possible: for consideration
The following list may form the basis to select from the characteristics of the immediately following section
And may be a basis of reordering the treatment of being e.g. ‘mind’ replaced by ‘presence’ and the logical aspects of the treatment of ‘presence’ – categories; free versus bound – included under being…
The analysis of mind and matter in Journey in Being resolves the mind-matter issue but leaves two points open
Perhaps the deepest viewpoint: That the mind-matter formulation of Journey in Being can be generalized to presence-actuality. Presence is the generalization of experience [mind] and actuality of the material aspect. However, the kind of argument in Journey in Being, can be used to show that the universe can be viewed as [1] presence or, alternatively but equivalently, as actuality; [2] as presence, with actuality as a phase of presence; or [3] as presence-actuality which is somewhat analogous to Schopenhauer’s die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung. In each of the three alternatives the meanings of ‘presence’ and actuality acquire different aspects and shades while the total metaphysics is also shaded differently and these distinctions require careful attention before either selection or demonstration of equivalence
The double aspect issue: in the mind-matter formulation of Journey in Being, I have sometimes written as though my resolution is a [similar to] double aspect formulation. That statement is not quite true because the ‘experience’ side is not a description of the world but is the experience of the world while it is the material side that is a description [although that, too, could be seen as a phase of experience or abstraction of that.] However, the double aspect arose only as I was experimenting with trial formulations and in the final formulation there is no double aspect. Rather, experience and matter are identical in their overlap but their secondary treatments may form a double aspect; and, at least in the generalization to presence-actuality, the non-overlap should be empty
Fundamental: significant and general. The fundamental system of characteristics are existence; accessibility and identity; community and interactivity; presence; actuality which implies extension, cause and change; meaning i.e. being is the result of becoming from which it derives significance; indeterminism – at least of proximate form and within time; recurrence –a form of determinism outside time– and fecundity; and good and evil
In the title, ‘Characteristics’ may be preceded by the adjective ‘fundamental,’ ‘basic,’ ‘important,’ ‘significant,’ or ‘essential…’
Note the similarity between characteristics and the concept of categories
Note the un-necessity of ‘substance;’ ‘being’ is sufficient
All being exists. Does nothingness exist? The lurking contradictions are not real but rather a con-fusion of concepts
Existence is dealt with in further detail below
Void ≈ absence
Do I want to consider ‘absence’ to be a characteristic? In two senses:
The void is equivalent to every being and to all being
Every being or element of existence has its own void ‘associated’ with it
All being is accessible to every being; this is known as The Principle of Being or The Principle of Accessibility
The idea of being in time is important. Becoming is essential to being; and the [semi-] stability of being is a not other than becoming. This implies the possibility of ‘time’ as a mode of description of the progression of becoming or, in the stable case, of the progression underlying being. Is time ‘real’? If, by time, we understand the process / progression then time has reality. However, the idea of time flowing independently of the world within which the world is located does not follow except as a mode of description with a domain of utility. While becoming is essential to being and implies the possibility of time as a mode of description, the ways of description to which we are accustomed in day to day life or in science do not follow either as inherent or as universal. In the idea of being as in-becoming the idea of a single universally coordinated time does not follow [relativity]
Further, some being transcends or is not in time; some [lower] being is in fragmented time; at the base of being is a fragmented aggregate of particles of time i.e. there are multiple times that are not fully coherent. This is distinct from the issue of time in relativity; aspects of these ideas including ‘the’ concept of time are developed in Journey in Being under ‘Cosmology’ and in the present document
There is a sense in which ALL BEING is out of or transcends time
The becoming [stability, bound] and transformation [free, mutability] requires them to be atomic in both extension and duration: and thus meaning is a project
Also see The Constitution of Being is a Result of its Becoming
The concept of space or extension and its connection with time will be developed later
Being is indeterminate in time and in form
Indeterminacy in time is the source of creation in time
Indeterminacy in form is the source of being as superposition and compounding: INDIVIDUAL-BEING-AS-IT-APPEARS º ALL BEING
There are phases that are determinate-like and causal-like; these are or appear to include being-as-we-find-it. The determinate is fundamental in this way but also derivative from the primary; as possible, it is also logically necessary; and it is clearly existential
There is a sense in which ALL BEING is determinate
Being exists as a community in that all beings may actually interact
J = Σ j
Higher being transcends community
For lower being, community is transient and tenuous
Communal interaction is essential to the constitution of individuated being; the meaning of community is an abstraction from the communities of particles and of life
Refer to the discussion of power in The Nature of Being and to the conclusion that there is only one uni-verse and every object can affect every other object. It follows that Plato’s notion of being is equivalent to the idea of being as community. But, following what is by now a standard train of logic, being as being [existence] and being as community are identical
Every element of being has the potential to interact with every other; every product of the void stands in intimate relation to every other. This is original knowledge which underlies every other knowing
Lower being has sense of meaning-as-we-experience it; higher being has no need of this
Our form of being may ask, What is Being? – Heidegger
Meaning entails
Discovery / self-discovery
Creation / self-creation: development of meaning requires Journey in Being
General comments are similar to those under matter
Because there are objections to the use of ‘mind’ we may refer instead to ‘experience’ which generalizes as ‘presence.’ This is discussed extensively in Journey in Being, the present document and others such as The Fundamental Problem of Metaphysics
Although not all experience is like our experience: Experience as Presence is Fundamental
The ‘experience’ of lower forms is not the form [‘like’] the experience of human beings; perhaps the lower forms do not deserve the label ‘experience’ but the point has been developed at length and rigorously in Journey in Being. Some writers have difficulty with this point and invoke reference to absurd or odious pan-psychism. However, if it is pan-psychism it is not at all a pan-psychism as is usually understood. The usual approach to the issue of pan-psychism is through seeking a foundation in matter-as-we-know-it combined with materialism; we eschew that combination and refer to being as such and its elements or elementary forms
The fundamental aspects of experience are attitude and action. ‘Pure experience’ may be thought of as attitude on idle
The ‘experience’ of higher forms must be interesting:
Attitude: e.g. knowing without [need for] perceiving; and perceiving all without need for inference or construction of theory
Action: willing = doing
A friend stated ‘consciousness’ is not the limit; there is something that we do not know and cannot know that is far beyond mere consciousness
[The principle of access reminds us that the ‘impossible’ is merely colossally remote or even appears so]
I developed the concept of presence in response to the friend’s anti-humanism
Human experience or consciousness is an example of the presence of a being to the universe – including itself
The form of being; the nature of its presence; and so on can infinitely exceed the apparent human actuality. However the fact of presence is not on a qualitative or numerical continuum; there is no going beyond presence and the infinite characters of being of Spinoza, when taken as being above presence, is a categorial mistake born of uncritical unmooring language from its tether
Presence is a re-formulation [generalization] of experience that emphasizes the ontological function of experience
[In classical metaphysics, presence has another meaning – it is really another symbol that looks the same – that is completely distinct from the present meaning]
Every element of being is present to other elements of being [the principle of community would have it that every element of being is or may be present to every other element.] This presence, in general, is no more like human or animal experience than the material aspect, i.e. the actuality, of every element of being is like the usual material objects of our everyday environment. Regarding the presence of elements of being to other elements of being, Leibnizian Monads may come to mind but I would not burden these ideas with Leibniz’ considerations. It is true, however, that Leibniz was attempting to address the interconnections of things especially in their at least occasional subjectivity that becomes a secret under the materialist inquisition. It is precisely this that is one of the functions of and a purpose behind the introduction of ‘presence.’ It should be remembered, however, that the actual and the present –even though the present is not emphasized– are combined in the idea of elements-in-interaction as in modern science that is frequently de-emphasized under the metaphor that sees the elements as ‘points of light’
The spiritual is more whole, more complete presence to and being-in
Combine with space and time?
Being is not essentially material and not all being has a material character
Logically, the material [or mental…] could be co-extensive with being but not super-extensive
But the at least co-extensivity of being with the material [or the mental or any other property or form of manifestation] requires no [further] argument beyond specification of the nature of being: being exists
But co-extensivity of anything else [material, mental…] requires demonstration. Breadth, depth, familiarity do not count as demonstration but are often, perhaps tacitly, taken as such… hence materialism, idealism and so on
In another era, the following commentary might be out of place. A suggestion that every thinker should, in reflection on materialism, occasionally think of it as ‘that absurd doctrine called pan-materialism’
Just as presence is the general form of experience, so actuality is the general form of the material aspect our world
In actuality as capable of actualizing in community, we see that so much of the false divide between ‘mind’ and ‘matter’ is not just in the dividing but in the false reduction of each to its gross form or properties
The soul endures; it is the thread of continuity in eternal recurrence; it is a function of the self, of its recognition of self as Atman and equivalent to Brahman
I have considered this elsewhere in these notes; what is the significance of the considerations?
On consideration of ‘mind’ and ‘matter’ as two attributes of being the idea of additional attributes arises; but it should not for mind and matter are not attributes of being in this way, rather they are objectifications of presence and actualization
Your life is possible. ‘Proof:’ What is actual is possible
Therefore, your life is but one in a ‘chain’ of an infinity of exact repetitions. Proof: what is possible is necessary
“The greatest weight. -- What, if some day or night a demon were to steal after you into your loneliest loneliness and say to you: ‘This life as you now live it and have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more; and there will be nothing new in it, but every pain and every joy and every thought and sigh and everything unutterably small or great in your live will have to return to you, all in the same succession and sequence--even this spider and this moonlight between the trees, and even this moment and I myself. The eternal hourglass of existence is turned upside down again and again, and you with it, speck of dust!’ Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus? Or have you once experienced a tremendous moment when you would have answered him: ‘You are a god and never have I heard anything more divine.’ If this thought gained possession of you, it would change, you as you are or perhaps crush you.”
Nietzsche, The Gay Science
So, Nietzsche finds ‘eternal return’ to be horrifying and paralyzing
Or, recall the Vedantic ‘Atman = Brahman,’ which also follows from the principles of Proof above. One may glory in this thought; but think of someone you consider most repulsive, most vile: you are that. But, the thought may even be comforting: you can accept your worst self – your dark, your shadow
Take up the possibilities of recurrence and identity:
The eternal return of your life in every infinite detail – this has no particular significance for on the assumption that you are unaware of past and future identical lives you never, in those lives, have any awareness [you may have glimmerings on account of the principles of accessibility, of necessity and possibility, of identity, and of eternal return] and therefore it is as if you have only one present life even though ‘you’ have an infinity of them. And even if there is an eternity between manifestations, it amounts to nothing
Similarly, parallel non-interacting but identical universes have the significance of a single universe
‘You’ will return as a rock [you ‘are’ a rock]
…or as a piece of foul slime [you ‘are’ slime]… Before getting carried away with the grandiosity of the principle of being remember this… and that you will return as that person or thing who you despise most
…or a sunset [you ‘are’…] … but these, too, have little significance because the content of the ‘experience’ is, if not nil, then close. The infinity of such manifestations amounts to nil…
But there are also higher manifestations, possible and therefore necessary:
Brahman; the ‘logic’ that even God cannot know God’s self is inapplicable and falls before the principle of access
Small variations that are possible therefore necessary: a human being aware of other lives. I have always found claims to actual past lives “the German peasant who knew the Upanishads in Sanskrit without ever having being exposed to Sanskrit or to Upanishadic thought” to be fake; what is fake is the defense of sublime truth by an example that is trivial and remote. However, the possibility is not false –the next manifestation of Christ and the Buddha might be an adulterous, psychotic but otherwise banal used car salesman– but it would more reasonably [while we are reflecting on this phase-epoch] expressed as the conscious access of the sub- or remote consciousness; or as a principle of logic: language brings the shadow into light. Conclude: Human Being is on A Cusp of Awareness… Heidegger’s Dasein is that Being that can ask “What am I?”
‘Higher’ variations: ‘over-being’ that subsumes e.g. human form as a phase through which it ‘cycles.’ And in the over-form it has access in its experience, access to all sub-forms. This is the anti-thesis of the love of questions, of ignorance, of the minuteness and parochialism of human beings… the belief that questions are more profound than any answer for, without the possibility of an answer, question has no meaning or sense and is senseless. The exclusive preoccupation with questions is a disease that is distinct from a sense of mystery or wonder. But, question-and-answer in balance e.g. 1000 questions to every answer is quite right… and the limit of the higher variations from any human or other approach: Brahman
While true becomings necessarily have an indeterministic character, recurrence points to an indeterminism outside time i.e. the possibilities of will be realized; but this is a consequence of the character of being as derived or seen from the nature of the void – recurrence is one of the possibilities
There is also repetition in extension i.e. the repetition of all objects and processes over and over in different parts of the one universe which, necessarily ‘exist’ in some of its phases
These considerations lead to the idea of fecundity
The considerations of this section also find a place under ‘cosmology’
Look at the uni-verse through the lens of science. We see elementary particles and forces in huge numbers i.e. repetition; these combine – elements and so on – accumulate into massive regions: the cosmos, galaxies, stars and stellar systems; but are also, through the elementary, capable of ‘infinitely’ varied forms: molecules, crystals, the vistas of a planet, life and its forms; and mind or presence – reduction etc. not implied
I call the infinite variety ‘fecundity’ and ‘proliferation.’ It may be fruitful to ask, “What can be learned from this about being?”
Brahman is beyond good and evil – and contains, without exception, all that is good and all that is evil
Without metaphysics, understanding of ethics is not impossible but meaningless. The anti-metaphysicians forget that hu-man is essentially a metaphysical animal even in his-her rejection of metaphysic. That hu-man is metaphysical refers to the categorial system of understanding that is part of his-her intuitive apparatus i.e. pro- and para-linguistic and at the core of his-her being. Those theoreticians who claim to exalt the ‘common man’ forget that there is no such object and to the extent that there might be they are equally ‘common.’ I.e. the labors of the metaphysician or of the analytic philosopher are no more esoteric than those of the carpenter and no more esoteric than the life, joy and pain of the leper with exposed and rotting limbs. I think that the reference to the common man is a manipulative device for those who, ensconced in ‘professionalism,’ have forgotten their nature as being; and I think that they secretly despise the common man of their fictional imagination; which amounts to a hidden despising of all being. Far more potent than “common sense” analysis is Wittgenstein’s analysis of use and his division of ‘uses’ of language into language ‘games.’ But the ‘games’ are not watertight as might be thought; and the idea of use as ‘arbiter’ is also an argument against any meta-discussion: Wittgenstein was not at all silent on “Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.”
Atman = Brahman; and in this sense the individual is beyond good and evil
But, the individual is not only Brahman but also his-her concrete individuated self and it is in his-her nature to act. Ethics are what guide action; it is implicit that being action e.g. human action involves choice – without choice there is process or motion but no action. The entire system of feeling, thought and will that guides action is ethics
What can it mean that all being is ethical or that being is ethical at the core?
For human being to have the ability to be ethical means that [1] The individual has a degree of choice regarding some of his or her actions. I.e. there are [sometimes] options and the individual can select or influence the outcome; and [2] The individual has a sense of good and evil, right and wrong. Ethics is not passive for actions include the creation of options – sometimes a lifetime occupation; and the sense and judgment of good and evil, right and wrong is never fully given and may require development by the persons – this may require the engagement of the deepest faculties of the individual
Any being that has the required constituent abilities, exists in an ethical dimension. For ‘higher’ being, it may be expected that the possibilities of ethical action are greater and that a greater proportion of action will be ethical; this is not against ‘enjoyment’ or passion for the ‘higher’ being will be also possessed of greater creative faculties
Brahman is the realization of ethical perfection; or the ethical is realized in Brahman. All ethics or morals are in Brahman which is beyond and has no need for them. This is an experimental statement. What sense does it make?
When it is realized that Atman is Brahman, that the individual is all individual – Ask not for whom the bell tolls, It tolls for thee – then it is seen that we are beyond good and evil. This means that the judgment of individuals is, in one way, without sense; at the same time, and paradoxically, the ‘unethical’ requires a response regardless of judgment; or, the response to unethical behavior is best when the threat is recognized without judgment of self or other. At the same time, as realized by Schopenhauer, this identity is the reason for intrinsic morality
What does it mean for lower being to be ethical? It is not ethical-as-we-know-it. Rather it has some of the elements e.g. indeterminism that is one of the bases of choice
… and hence the importance of both ‘feeling’ or emotion and ideas and cognition to ethics and real ethical behavior… and genuine care
…similarly, both bound and free elements are required for knowledge; the bound for grounding, the free to build upon…
…and, here the connection: ethics determine or enter into the determination of what may be counted as knowledge! For: if the object [value] is certainty then knowledge is judged by some criterion e.g. ‘justified true belief;’ but if knowledge enables action, remains in the loop with action, then what is knowledge is determined by what makes for ‘good’ or successful action… rather, there is, in the end no determination even though there is intermediate determination and at the intermediate level both ‘determinations’ or criteria of knowledge are valid and interact
… are what may be understood from being-in-the-world [ours] including our system of knowledge and its disciplines: symbols, sciences, history, art, religion and artifact
In the following, -> points to what may be learned for being; => points to learning across disciplines and among levels of understanding [this phase-epoch <-> all being]
Material -> Actual
Quantum mechanics -> quasi-atomicity of entities that follow from quasi-stability in indeterminism => form of life
Ergodic aspects -> recurrence => death
Becoming [evolution] => recurrence
Form of life => the categories and their nature
Death
[Society and history fit well here even though they might be separate; similarly symbol, art, religion and artifact are also aspects or products of mind and society]
The nature and possibility of intuition
The nature and possibility of symbols
Freedom of ideas and will
The categories e.g. space, time, cause and ‘chaos’
I hesitate to use ‘chaos’ due to its recent use; however it is briefer than ‘indeterminism.’ The intuition of chaos may be labeled humor
Communality
A priori elements of history: the fact of history, the facts of interconnection and separation, the fact that we interpret
A posteriori elements: the contingent facts that are sometimes interpreted as necessities or indications of present greatness; that we must interpret
[Consider as aspects of mind, society]
‘Ontology’ is The Theory of Being but here the meaning is more specific; I am referring to kind or choice of ontology e.g. substance ontology; or as an alternative an ontology with ‘process’ or ‘relationship’ as fundamental or e.g. Whitehead’s ‘Philosophy of Organism’ in which includes among other things, substance, process, and relationship as equally fundamental and [my position] non-absolute
At this point at this general level of discussion it is not possible, desirable or meaningful specify a definite ontology
It is possible, however, to describe a variety of possible ontological positions and to discuss the distinction or lack of true distinction among them. It may be possible to discuss distinguishability and ‘isomorphisms’ of the conceptual fields; to the extent that isomorphisms exist and the distinctions are only what is emphasized or superficial, there will be [1] an advance in the nature of metaphysical system and [2] advance in understanding for the fact that the systems are not truly distinct reduces the number of ontological possibilities and therefore confidence in the residual variety
One reason for the distinction between ontological systems is as follows. It is sometimes argued that substance ontology is deficient in not admitting ‘relation’ and ‘process’ either as fundamental or at all. This is based in [1] generally on a metaphor of substance as monadic in nature but more specifically e.g. Aristotle’s monadic concept of substance, and [2] a defect of language in that it does not capture the dynamic reality of the world. Thus Whitehead posits the ‘Philosophy of Organism’ that includes on the side of substance, substance itself and form and subjective form, and on the other side both process and relationship which, in a way, overcomes the defect. This enhancement brings ontology in line with modern physics in that the latter has substance which however is not eternal, relationship e.g. force, and process which is what substance undergoes under the mutual interaction that is force; this is a dynamic system and it is possible to ‘compute’ the dynamics with mathematics i.e. after the substance-relation-process has been expressed in mathematics. Now mathematics may be regarded, in this context, as a structure overlaid upon language and so the apparent defect is not absolute… but neither is it altogether removed as metaphysics for mathematical physics is not known to be capable of representing all of physical reality
The distinction between ontological systems is therefore in some respects a defect. Substance, as originally formulated, that enduring object that underlies the actual thing is poorly conceived; better to think in terms of categories of existence rather than a category: non-eternal substance, relationship, process; and the experiential side can be included by noting that physical reality need not be merely ‘physical’ reality and, perhaps, with the aid of abstraction
It is not clear that the categorial system needs to be posited for it may fall out, wholly or partially, of application of the principle of the void perhaps in combination with the possibility of this-world-as-I-know-it e.g. the discussions elsewhere in this document that being requires becoming [process] and that individual being partakes of all being [relationship]…
It is not necessary to specify as detailed a system as Whitehead’s; much of the detail should fall out of the principle of the void [i.e. the principle of being] combined with obvious principle that this world, the world-as-I-know-it, is possible
The system that I might develop here will be another [possible] bridge between the Theory of Being and General Cosmology
This book has a useful collection of systems of metaphysics, of theories of origins and epistemologies
In the present section I review some aspects of the being of entities in relation to their being as becoming, their actuality, and presence [recall that actuality is abstraction from material nature, presence is abstraction from experience]
…level of concrescence; ‘concrescence’ is borrowed from Whitehead
…modality of transaction; constituted in part from level of concrescence
Entities are quasi-stable concrescences in transition; transition is constituted by transaction
The being of concrescence is constituted by its becoming
A ‘better description’ is on a T-R-T [trt] i.e. transaction-mutuality-transition metaphor... or model. Special cases are entity-relation-process, state-dynamics-process, particle-force-process, being-interaction-becoming, species-interaction [competition-cooperation]-evolution…
Concrescence and transaction are ‘faces’ of TRT
…or model; on analogy from the state-dynamics-process description
A symbolic calculus may be both under specified [inadequate] and over specified [concrete] relative to an open description and, yet, useful in the development of understanding and, perhaps, of possibility and therefore of some actuality
[Presence and actuality ‘reside’ within being; this section is not outside Concrescence and transaction; Whitehead may use ‘actual’ in a different sense]
Level and modality
Free – bound
Free: variety and quality [modality] and their integration in concrescence; intensity is secondary
Bound: intensity and quality [modality] and their integration in concrescence; variety is not secondary but of a different character – its different locus in the organism, its development over time and relations within the bound, and the contribution from the free
Free and bound are on a continuum and mutual; mutuality may show up as mutual conditioning
Internal – external
[The idea of a fixed externality is spurious as there is no fixed internality; the distinction, even for a quasi-stable organism, depends upon the occasion; he internal – external distinction is related to ‘local / non-local’]
Internal: entity
External: other
A ‘wide’ mental state is supposed to depend on the physical state of the environment and not only on the physical state of the organism; a ‘narrow’ mental state is defined in its dependence only on the physical state of the organism. The mistake behind this distinction is that there are alternate modes of description: a direct one in which the mental state is a constitutive function of the physical state of the organism and, since the physical state of the organism is also causally related to the environment an indirect one in which the mental state includes causal dependence on the environment. Thus given a mode of description in which a ‘wide’ mental state can be expressed as a function f(organism, environment) there is at the same time a ‘narrow’ description. Therefore, it does not follow that ‘wide’ and ‘narrow’ define a proper distinction; and it does not follow that individuals in identical physical states may have distinct experience… rather the reverse is true
An analogy may be made with the description of physical systems whose state is constitutively dependent only on its configuration but which may also be written as causally dependent on the environment
A better expression of the intended distinction is free versus bound; both find their interpretation in the organism without constitutive reference to the environment
Elaborated in Actual Cosmology where TRT becomes E-R-P or entity-relation-process [spatial configuration-force-process in physical cosmology where ‘force,’ ‘spatial configuration,’ and ‘process’ have concrescence-transactional interpretations]
The modality for ERP depends on the level of concrescence but the ‘body,’ ‘force,’ ‘process’ and related modes of description may be preserved in the integration [concrescence, interaction] of lower into higher levels; and in the ‘classical’ realm the transactional character of entities may become less apparent
Elaborated in Human Being …and Human Society, the sub-sections of Actual Cosmology starting with Life, especially in Mind and Its Metaphysics and some subsequent sections
The free / bound distinction exists at all levels
At higher levels [of organization] there is greater variety and freedom of presence
Afferent-free: ‘attitude’
Afferent-to-efferent and free: ‘higher’ cognition, thought, ‘higher’ emotion
Efferent-free: action
[Above: the source of ‘sense’ and ‘reference’]
The topics implied are:
The Being of All Being i.e. What is the being of the one uni-verse?
The Being of the Elements of Being i.e. What is the being of the elements or constituents of the uni-verse?
The Being of All Being as A Community of The Elements of Being
‘Community’ is significant; it is not mere collection or aggregation. It includes interaction but not the interaction of characterless particles; instead the interaction involves and may affect the character of the ‘element’
Some years ago, I wrote a since marginalized essay ‘Being and The Elements of Being.’ I felt uncomfortable about ‘The Elements of Being.’ What were they? Were they atoms – literally, the atoms of physics; were they elements of mind-stuff; were they individuals; were they Leibnizian Monads? The discomfort was twofold: what were the elements, any of these either alone or in combination and why… and what is the Being of the Elements?
Since then I have somewhat overcome the discomfort – or accepted it! If you are an a priori atomist or materialist – if you are not you are open to questioning atomism and materialism – you will have the same discomfort. It is a discomfort that remained for me even after I had gotten over my explicit a priori atomism but, no doubt, implicit a priori atomism remained
The resolution is that ‘What are the elements of being?’ and ‘What is there being?’ not immediately regarded as immediately known. Instead, the approach is ‘algebraic’ i.e. from various considerations understanding of Being progresses from explicit dark to light –the various topics above– and it is important that the ignorance is allowed and accepted; there is an analogy to physics where over the time that it has been reasonable to talk of atoms the understanding has advanced
What are the considerations that allow understanding of being? Two primary considerations used here are: the logic of the void and its relation to all being; and the facts, conditions and experiences of our own existence – from the facts of our being e.g. the unarticulated experience of the body to the articulated experience of perception and thought to the descriptions and theories of science and the various systems of philosophy and metaphysics taken as ideas rather than given. There is no reason to suggest that there are no other considerations
It is not necessary –nor is it possible for me to currently– specify the elements with completeness and precision
There is no pressing need to standardize the elements e.g. the atoms or elementary particles of physics. When I use the words ‘elements of being’ I may occasionally think of the particles of physics but, here, I am not attached to that view; instead I shun it –despite its temptations– as premature and immature
Some possibilities for the elements are: the elementary particles; the elementary particles interpreted as monads i.e. possessed of presence; individuals or persons. Any thing that possesses power in Plato’s sense is a candidate
It is not necessary to require that the elements be fixed especially as elements of understanding but also as elements of being per se
What are the characteristics of the elements: primarily actuality, presence, power, determinacy/indeterminacy and community; extension and process may also be considered
An element of being e.g. an elementary particle has feeling – presence? This begins to sound absurd. But it is not. It is perfectly valid question, ‘What is the feeling of an element of being?’ Where it is understood that the ‘feeling of an elementary particle’ is nothing other than its interactivity, its power – the capacity to affect and be affected as inherent in the element [immanent] rather than as imposed or merely external, its communality. The word ‘feeling’ is chosen in its meaning as the simplest of our experience but in its application to all elements of being it is not assumed to have the character of our feeling unless the element in question is an individual. However, inasmuch as I am constituted of elements my experience is a result of the community of feeling elements
This is characterized by the foregoing sections of Division 1, the present division
Equivalent to nothingness, to the void [which is not the quantum vacuum but underlies it]
Existent, possessed of power; for all being, existence is equivalence to nothingness, power is its manifestation in unending infinity of form
Actual, present, eternal, recurrent, extensive, repetitive, communal, determinate in balance with indeterminacy of form and process, fecund, and possessed of the elements of good and evil
This is the subject matter of General Cosmology
The following anticipates later development but is not circular
What is common to all being; a tautology
What must and what does exist
See discussion above
Does matter exist? As being-as-such, no for matter is essentially a concept or objectification of being. However, we can think of being as matter provided we accept the corresponding concept of matter as provisional in the history of ideas and science. In this sense we can regard matter as a mode of being
Does a property exist? It exists as a property but not as material… on some accounts of matter but on account of the history of what counts as material properties may exist
Do experiences exist – yes, clearly. Are experiences material? Not on all accounts of mind / matter but on the theory in Journey in Being and with matter appropriately understood as the actual, then, perhaps yes!
Symbol
Does a symbol exist? The sign for the symbol exists. But as a symbol i.e. as referring to something? On the above kind of account [experiences,] yes!
Do Mathematical Objects Exist
A mathematical object may be said to exist in its own way if it can refer to some actual object. For this sense of existence, the logical coherence of the mathematical system that contains the object is required – thus the number ‘one’ exists in this sense. [A system can also be an object]
Is ‘one’ a material or actual being? Yes, again in the foregoing sense
Does ‘one’ exist in any other senses? [a] As a form or concept. A form exists in the sense of form if some actual object can have the form. And forms can exist as material in the foregoing sense. [b] If ‘one’ is defined by the property of ‘one-ness’ or if ‘one’ is defined as the class of collections that contain one object [this is not circular since ‘one’ is used in different senses in the its places]
What could it be, what is it?
There is one absolute object – the noumenon?
… in which noumenon = phenomenon?
On the knower-known intuition, the idea of perceived-object being in-itself is not error but without meaning
I do not consider this section important but it may turn out to be useful. Statements are made “as is” and need to be thought through, pared, improved
For Aristotle, a category of being is a way of being; the categories are the most general classes of things that can be said to ‘be’ in one of the various senses of the word
Aristotle’s categories are generally rejected because of their basis in Aristotle’s notion of substance which is also rejected. Aristotle’s categories begins with an attempt at a general and exhaustive account of things that there are [ta onta.] Aristotle lists ten categories of which substance is fundamental and upon which the others depend. Aristotle’s categories, then, are: substance, quality, quantity, relation, space, time, posture, condition, state, activity or cause, and effect. See History of Western Philosophy for a brief explanation of the nature of these categories and their basis in the concept of substance. Also see Aristotle's Metaphysics at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Kant and Schopenhauer re-worked and re-deployed Aristotle’s system into a system of categories of intuition [in the Kantian sense]
Here are some categories: physical objects, minds, classes, properties, relations taken from the page Categories of Being from Wikipedia the Free Encyclopedia
Theory of being is concerned with the nature of things or entities and cosmology is concerned with what entities there may be and what relationships and extents they may have; this is general cosmology. In contrast, physical cosmology concerns the physical things, relationships and extent of [this phase-epoch of] the uni-verse
The threads of the fabric are the ‘individual’ journeys; thus the Universe is not one continuous cut of cloth and not a cut whose individual threads traverse its entire ‘width.’ … with ‘j’ for individual journeys and ‘J’ for The Journey of Being, we write:
J = Σ j
It is not necessary to show all details [all being and knowledge] but to demonstrate the range in principle, with illustration and according to the principles below
This topic is already in Division 3 but the theoretical aspects may be selectively placed here / repeated there. Some good reasons for placement here:
Foundation in the void is developed here
Principles of generation are treated here
The range of human experience and knowledge are considered here and these constitute the [best] knowledge of the range of being; and this is extended by the Theory of Being developed here; here, supplemented by Divisions 2 – 4, we find adequate examples
…and from the foregoing points we may be able to develop a Theory of the Variety of Being
Also: Human Being and Human Society
Objective: the nature and possibility of human being. The question has a universal side that will derive from the theory of the void; and a local side that will derive from studies of ‘man,’ of mind [below; in the details of the study mind is considered broadly;] additionally Heidegger’s ideas may be useful
Implications for the previous point
Implications for BEING in general
Source: Alfred North Whitehead, Adventures of Ideas, 1933
As noted above, this sub-topic could appear in one or more of the following topics: Theory of Being, Knowledge, or The Problems of Metaphysics; the point may be repeated in the stated topics; note that if it occurs in more than one of the topics, different aspects may be treated in the different section
Issues include:
Showing the entire range in principle without completing in an Encyclopedic way
Showing that the stated range is the entire range. Or, answering the question as best I / we can, “To what extent is the given range complete?” Of course, completeness will not be regarded as not obtaining on account of gaps of fact and detail
Question of human knowledge versus knowledge
In the first place, it is the Theory of Being that shows this possibility
But what if we did not have my theory of being? Any individual who says ‘There is no universal law’ already knows the possibility;’ for that is the essence of the theory. That is one who believes in the primacy of his or her existence over ideas
An alternative is to approach the ultimate through analysis of actual being and knowledge and the idea of the ultimate; actual being and knowledge has [partial] ordering and the idea requires to use the ordering to point to the ultimate; done intelligently, the process is one of given and take between study within the actual, study of the idea of all being. This is my process; and even though the theory of being shows the possibility of knowledge, realization of the ultimate it does not provide the fullest account of the ultimate. That may be unattainable while in human form but the process described leads to a fuller account
Therefore the second topic in Division 1 will be General Cosmology which will include the novel account of time and origins supplemented by an account of space / space-time and of creation i.e. of space-time-matter; that applies to but is not restricted in its application to the present phase-epoch of the uni-verse… and to the ‘physical uni-verse’ even though it is not clear, without specification, what the physical uni-verse is [relatively, it is clearer what the physical aspect of the present phase epoch of the physical universe is.] But, the theory of time-creation is one of time-matter and, therefore, should include space-time-matter or, at least, its foundation. In Journey in Being –and immediately above– have alluded to the fact that, here, in cosmology is a place for a foundation of a physical theory of space-time-matter such as in the general theory of gravitation [relativity] and quantum mechanics [the mechanics having something to do, perhaps, with an ongoing relation of the elements of creation with their near-stable existence that includes a foundation in the void.] I have been reflecting on a development of such a foundation in concrete terms and the section on cosmology might be an appropriate place to place such a treatment
Topics in this section will be
Development of the General Cosmology
A Foundation for a Physical Theory of Space-Time-Matter
Topics from Journey in Being
Topics from the section on The Theory of Being
Topics suggested by A. N. Whitehead’s 1929 Process and Reality
Other topics needed
Some elements of the Theory of Being
Abstraction from Actual Cosmology with details of origins eliminated and replaced by the concept of ‘accident’ which includes in its conception the notion of indeterminism contingently in balance with pseudo-determinism; and ‘generalization’ to include experience
Space, time, cause, law… are these immanent or imposed?
Considering the [one] uni-verse which is everything –including our understanding, everything there is immanent, even God... regardless of the relation of God to this phase-epoch of the universe. And although everything is necessarily universal it is not necessarily universal. ‘God’ has many meanings, and in the relation of this phase-epoch of the universe to the whole it is possible to conceive of a remote God who imposes his law; but that God would still be immanent though not universal i.e. not pan-immanent in the uni-verse
Here is a vast field for the confusion of the type I have criticized so often: sophistry about partially formed concepts, concepts taken out of their field of coherent connection and regard piece-wise, and confusion of different uses of words; the confusion that Wittgenstein, in his internal conflict between his own creative force and his intensely critical attitude that may have arisen from the very creativity applied to criticality, also noted but then turned into an entire philosophy so that he is often regarded as having said that there is no such thing as a substantive philosophy of which we can talk
Regarding time in this phase-epoch a number of possibilities arise. Remember that every particle –either discrete or an element in a continuum– may be regarded as having its own time; and that phase-epochs may arise in which there is more-or-less coherence of kinds of particles in communality of a local common origin or seed and more-or-less coherence of their times; that within such a phase epoch there may described time coordinate systems that, from some perspectives appear to be an absolute grid. It is possible for the ‘intrinsic’ and more-or-less coherent times to be either immanent in or imposed on the phase-epoch depending on its relation to the whole uni-verse. Further, regardless of the actual nature of the intrinsic times it is possible to take them as immanent and then to interpret the time-grid as imposed when regarded as fixed; similar comments may be given for space. It remains, however, that whatever time and space may be in the uni-verse, they are immanent in that universe even when local and even when created; i.e. even when time and space are the impositions of sentience, they correspond to something that is immanent: everything real is immanent but it or its appearances may be interpreted as imposed; but not all appearances will have a proper universal immanent interpretation even if there is a locally valid immanent interpretation
A. N. Whitehead, Adventures of Ideas, 1933, elaborates “four antagonistic schools of thought regarding the analysis of the notion of Law, The School of Immanence, the School of Imposition, the Positivist School of Observation, that is to say, of mere Description, and finally the School of Conventional Interpretation.” [My italics]
A general metaphysics of space, time and being may fit here
It is important to consider space, time and being together; consideration e.g. of time alone, though interesting is necessarily incomplete
Any theory of space, time, being fits within a theory of being; i.e. in the particular theory certain fundamental features of being are being considered
Alternative concepts that could be the focus of attention: for space – position, extension, situated object or aspects of object; for time – process, duration, change
The following observations from The Categories: Immanent or Imposed are relevant and applicable here:
The vast opportunity for confusion arising out of confusion of different concepts [one sign, multiple symbols;] partial concepts taken as complete; concepts taken out of the contextual field regarded as concrete and complete in themselves
…accordingly alternative interpretations of categories especially of space, time, cause as immanent or imposed according to whether a phase-epoch or the whole is considered, whether the concept or a grid is being considered, what special relation between the whole and the phase-epoch and among phase-epochs obtain
These points could appear in A Foundation for a Physical Theory of Space-Time-Matter, below, but it is also of more general application at least inasmuch as that foundation is to be applied only to this phase-epoch of the universe. See the discussion in The Categories: Immanent or Imposed for the preliminary to the following developments:
That the conceptions show how a moving clock may have a different rate than a grid of ‘stationary’ clocks; to show how requires a dynamics
That a moving continuum may have a length contraction relative to a ‘stationary’ continuum; shows space-time grids to not be universally decomposable into space grids and time grids; to show how requires a dynamics
That two ‘particles’ may have different intrinsic time rates; to show how these time rates become coordinated in a coherent phase-epoch and to show under what circumstances and how much variation from the coordination may occur [the twin ‘paradox’] also requires a dynamics
We see, then, how relativity might obtain and that the fixing of the details and law-like behavior requires a specific local dynamics. Quantum theory and the theory of the quantum vacuum might arise from considerations of the indeterministic nature of origins; while specific stable dynamics and the possibility of stable systems within the dynamics might arise through selection rather than deterministic process
ė[τ, α] = f[e, τ, α]; e = entity [vector of dimension n;] τ = time [vector of dimension n;] α = attribute [n x m matrix]
Preliminary hypothesis: the quantized form is identical to the pre-quantized with a different interpretation
Combine with the sections on cosmology in Journey in Being and Journey in Being: Foundation and the section on Physical Cosmology in the foundation
The foregoing completes present considerations for development. In the actual development I may use the following sections
Foundations of Quantum Mechanics
Essence of quantum mechanics
Quantum vacuum
Calculus of propositions
Further Needs
Logic from LOGIC
Quantum mechanics & the vacuum developed from LOGIC / void / cosmology
Journey in Being begins the discussion of the origins of being, of a phase-epoch and its time and space and ‘matter’ from the void – or alternatively it begins the discussion of the equivalence of being and the void
In this document Mind / Body and Atomism, The Philosophy of Time, Concepts and Slackness, On the Possibility of Science and the Origin of Dynamics and the Effectiveness of Mathematics, On the Synthesis of World and Idea, Eliminating Concepts of Mind, Noumenon and Phenomenon, On Assumptions in Inductive Inference
From the new outline of Journey in Being in this document: Process, change: Time, Extension: Space, Indeterminacy, Matter or Material Nature, Aristotle and Others on Being, Human Being and Human Society, the present section General Cosmology, A Foundation for a Physical Theory of Space-Time-Matter, On Categories, Mental Disorders and Creativity
The following considerations are pertinent but are to be generalized to consideration of space-time; I have added comments without distinction as to source
What should a philosophy of time do: develop the concept of time in a systematic theory or class of theories; address various issues of immanence, universality, whether time is real or a grid and if the latter what real underlies the idea e.g. process or intrinsic time or intrinsic process; reveal or provide understanding for the latest understanding from physics – in general and special questions such as time travel and the twin ‘paradox,’ the continuum issue, the coordination question of the relation among instants, places and events; understand the relation between the perception-conception of time and time itself; address various philosophical and related issues such as various paradoxes of time, absolute versus relational theories of time, the direction and arrow of time, the question of the flow of time, reality of past-present-future
It is imperative that real problems be distinguished from those arising from confusions of concept and meaning…
Technical problems e.g. temporal indexicals and essentially tensed facts; the symbolic logic of time and relation to modal logics
This topic straddles Theory of Being and General Cosmology
May generalize to Foundation for a Theory of Nature
These are brief, telegraphic notes on the main and recent ideas with already developed concepts details in Journey in Being and some supporting documents and future developments outlined in notes. In, Journey in Being; this sub-topic will be placed under the topic on General Cosmology, below
Note that the concept of the void, here, bears little relation to the ideas of Sartre whose work I have searched fruitlessly for suggestive thought on the nature of the void; and, while, Heidegger –and recent thought up to the present– have the same root concept of the void as mine, I have found that work to be conceptually impotent. I am leaning toward use of a term other than ‘nothing’ or ‘nothingness’ e.g. ‘void.’ A preliminary to the foundation sought is
What is the void or nothingness? The idea is well developed in Journey in Being; here is a recapitulation with some recent improvements and refinements. The first thought is that nothingness is what obtains in the absence of things. But nothingness seems to be more [less] than the mere absence of things e.g. in the absence of things do the ‘laws of nature’ remain [we should really refer to the natural laws of the present-phase epoch which is really all that physics knows; this has a logical dimension for the present phase-epoch is or has some congruence with the domain over which the ideal laws of physics apply] and does space-time remain? The answer to the question depends on what is meant by ‘thing.’ In its most common meaning, the absence of things allows that law [cause or, at least some degree of causation] and space-time remain. But on a more general meaning of thing, the meaning includes reference to laws or law [and pattern] and to space-time as ‘thing.’ In Journey in Being the logical nature of void or nothingness was considered. Nothingness is not the mere absence of things – that is no-thing-ness. Instead, nothingness is the absence of everything. Of course logical difficulties and contradiction are close to the surface as soon as we talk of everything / nothing in the most general sense where the stem ‘thing’ refers not merely to material object but to anything that may exist. These logical issues were considered in Journey in Being and therefore will not be repeated in detail here. But consider: can / does nothingness exist? If it exists then, in the void, it must not exist. This apparent contradiction points, to the subtlety rather than the impossibility. I.e. in seeking the concept of the void, how far can we go? Logically, from Journey in Being, if complete absence were to obtain and to remain then that state of permanent nothing would amount to a pattern, a law, a determinism which would contradict the state of void. This points to the creative potential of the void and the relation of this to the idea of zero point energy and the uncertainty principle of quantum mechanics. Again, instead of the logical approach and its dependence on language and concepts consider what happens when we look at the universe and begin –in thought– to take away things. When this operation is complete, what is left? To think that law, pattern, space-time are left is to think that these are something over and above the collection of things. It does seem that human expression of the known laws, human perception of patterns, and the human coordination of space-time are over and above mere thing-hood. However, in themselves, law and so on is inherent in the accumulation or collection of things – we may want to refer to LAW, PATTERN and to SPACE-TIME rather than law, pattern and to space-time to emphasize this idea.
Details are in Journey in Being where it is pointed out the following meaning of universe is necessary to the development; without this meaning e.g. there is a tendency of erroneous projection of local properties to all being; however, it follows from logic of the discussion of the void, that the very idea of the local as universal is not merely a projection but involves logical contradiction. The main point is that ‘universe’ which should most appropriately mean all being in its accumulation or interrelatedness is often used to refer to the present phase-epoch; or used as in “this universe is but one of infinitely many bubble universes.” All being in its interrelatedness was the most appropriate meaning in the development of a general cosmology – from the void or otherwise – and while the parochial meaning is not with out sense, I refer to the one universe, the one-universe or to the uni-verse to emphasize to refer to the most inclusive meaning
This is developed in the general theory of being [not yet labeled as such] and the general cosmology of Journey in Being. The logical necessity of becoming follows from the fact that its absence contradicts the concept of void. Becoming from the void is similar to local becoming from the quantum-vacuum except that the laws of quantum production [pairs, laws] do not obtain so that original becoming is ‘floppy’ and what becomes is not at all restricted to the entities of the physics of the present phase-epoch of the uni-verse. As far as modern physics is concerned, while an original singularity is not proven, the assumption of a singularity and physics permits explanation of most of the general features of the evolution of the physical universe after 10-43 seconds or the Planck time. Events before this time are shielded from current science and from experimental observation [elucidate the paradigmatic assumptions behind this putative theoretical fact.] However, foundation in the void or nothingness as developed in Journey in Being provides some foundation from before 10-43 seconds; elucidate the nature of the foundation! Some of the developments here and in Journey in Being are pertinent to this…
To be developed further as needed. In general, the becoming of LAW, PATTERN or the POSSIBILITY of pattern and SPACE-TIME is coeval with the becoming of simple thing-hood; the logic of this is laid out above. Thus, the quantum vacuum cannot be the ultimate foundation of becoming even though it can be a useful local stand-in for becoming. It seems that uni-versal law, the womb of all law, is and must be no law. To what extent are the laws of physics founded in the quantum vacuum and to what extent in what came before?
To be developed as needed
We may think of the quantum vacuum as what is left when all objects are removed from the universe, leaving the vacuum fluctuations and the space-time matrix. Within the quantum vacuum, virtual matter and anti-matter particle pairs are continually being created and destroyed. This is both a consequence of quantum mechanical law; and of the Heisenberg principle [a consequence of the law;] that requires the quantum vacuum to be a minimum energy state of quantum potential; the creation-destruction fluctuations violate energy-momentum for periods and lengths less than the Planck time and length and thus has no effect on macroscopic laws. This quantum mechanical vacuum, due to continual creation-destruction, exerts a pressure on material objects – the Casimir Effect predicted in 1948 by Hendrik Casimir and confirmed recently. The quantum vacuum may provide the fabric of space-time in the present phase-epoch. In modern physics, the quantum vacuum is often referred as to the actual ‘nothing’ but it is not and rather it probably has remote foundation in the void which is SPACE-TIME-LESS, PATTERN-LESS and LAW-LESS. Some physicists believe that the universe [this phase-epoch but not generally stated or recognized] and the laws and properties of Nature [again limited to this phase-epoch but not generally stated or recognized] emerged from the quantum vacuum. But, to repeat the question from two paragraphs prior: To what extent are the laws of physics founded in the quantum vacuum and to what extent in what came before?
The quantum vacuum is not the void… as noted above
The quantum vacuum is ‘on the way’ to the void; i.e. conceptually, the quantum vacuum stands between this phase-epoch of the uni-verse and the void. More accurately, if the quantum mechanics of the present phase-epoch were projected to the uni-verse, the validity of which projection implies logical contradiction, then the quantum vacuum would stand conceptually in between the uni-verse and the void
Option 1: origin of –the quantum properties or description of– the present phase-epoch in the becoming from the void
Option 2a: origin of the quantum vacuum – of the present phase-epoch – from the void; and, Option 2b: origin of the present phase-epoch from the quantum vacuum. Option 2b is part of modern quantum theory – or its consequences – as developed in by Heisenberg, Schrödinger, Dirac and others in decade 1920-1930
Plan: Extend the following to space-time-matter; incorporate into Journey in Being [/outline below]
First, some Principles of Understanding and Explanation
The use of the idea of slackness in concepts corresponding to an underdetermination of being
The tension between science and philosophy
Now, comments on the Philosophy Time and its Place in Cosmology and the Theory of Being
Physical time and its relation to psychological time
Relational vs. absolute concepts of time
Relational vs. absolute concepts of time again
Incorporate: Time from the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy [local copy,] Philosophy of Time on John McTaggart Ellis McTaggart’s arguments for the non-existence of time [local copy,] Quentin Smith on the philosophy of time, Links from Google on Time and Timelessness [in the Philosophy of Science > Philosophy of Physics > Time and Timelessness directory,] Philosophy of Time [Google Search,] Philosophy of Time [AlltheWeb Search]
We would not actually expect to have an independently standing philosophy of time; rather we will have a philosophy of being, of cosmology or of physics and so on out of which would fall and be created an understanding of time… this does not mean that everything interacts to the point of indistinguishability but [a] we should allow, in advance, for interaction and [b] we expect additional insight from co-consideration of all the concepts in the field
What do we need to do to separate out [and do we so need to make separation of] our enmeshment in the world or, rather, our local environment? Remember the nature of concepts, the forms of intuition and symbolic expression – their interaction and advance
We modify the idea that metaphysics is impossible to “things may not be what they seem to be in the intuition including art but focusing on the in-tuition and symbolic expression i.e. in science and analysis puts us on the way to truth that is not limited to the forms and capabilities of the intuition – which limitation is the fundamental one that is assumed in positivism, empiricism and Kantian idealism… ” and, therefore, review of ideas and their history / community is important but not all ideas or considerations will remain in the end and few, if any, will remain untouched or unmodified
Too many, though not all writers today do just what was implied in the previous principle – they review current thought and the history of thought regarding a topic and leave it as one or a number of grand mysteries along with the impression that enough has been said i.e. construction, though eschewed, is implied and implicit… we must also build even as we exalt in the contemplation of mystery. And, examples of universalization have been set in – in Journey in Being – the construction of cosmology and the understanding of mind – these can serve as paradigms; further, principles of universal construction have been considered that include the transcendental analytic and transcendental logic along with the synthesis of symbolic conception with intuition subject to critical comparison against the world
As has been noted such slackness in concepts is a virtue when the being in question is underdetermined. Now, the idea that a being is undetermined is without meaning until it is pointed out that the underdetermination is relative to what thought, intuition or convention may ascribe to the being of the entity in question. Thus, time may be thought to be a continuum and infinitely divisible and debate may ensue including reference to, e.g., coarseness due to quantum effects… however, it may be unnecessary and uninformative – even misleading – to suggest that time is or is not a continuum or coarse at small enough intervals… and, instead, given the origin of a single, dominant and universal-like time in the coalescing or common origin of a stable universe such distinctions [continuum vs. discretum] may be locally practical to consider but universally irrelevant. Note that I when refer to a local scene I may be referring to our causal or quasi-causal phase-epoch of the entire universe of being that we sometimes refer to as “the universe” when we are, in fact, referring to the phase-epoch in question. Especially in going from the local to the universal, the concrete gives way to the underdetermined and indeterminate, the singular to the plural and the existent to the potential. Note, however, as in the case of mind as discussed in Journey in Being, the indeterminateness in object and incomplete determination of concept is not restricted to the universal but to [many of] our most immediately apprehended objects or forms of being e.g. mind and matter
This gives way to a communication between concept and object [concept includes theoretical consistency and object focus includes the empirical i.e. the need to be real.] The distinction between science and philosophy of nature, between scientist and philosopher which has been exalted into a sometimes antagonism is recognized to be a blurred distinction with poles but no sharp division that corresponds to academic custom
Such principles have been enunciated elsewhere e.g. in the discussion of mind in Journey in Being – all such principles should be gathered together and applied uniformly to all cases. Uniform application means tailoring according to need; and use of a field of concepts as necessary and efficient. Additionally such codifications will apply not only to the study of nature [mind, matter…] and ideas [concepts, knowledge] but also to institutions that include science, the disciplines… and to the more general study of society including politics, economics and their institutions [here, law is considered to be part of politics]
I.e. of the philosophical, especially the analytic approaches. A simple observation: in terms of actual understanding – especially since it requires a balance among intuition, action and analysis which includes imagination – there can be too much philosophy especially analysis or too much science. This is not meant to be a critical statement although there are implied criticisms of certain endeavors and it is emphatically not intended to be a repressive proscription for there is a place for all kinds of activity and kinds of individual [within reason] and including the purely analytical and the purely critical i.e. understanding itself benefits from a plurality of kinds of persons and attitudes and the forward motion, in general, is a function of the interplay and does not come under the rule of any one kind; and, the actual process of guiding the balance of analysis, experiment and intuition is itself experimental with trial and correction coming in to play. A further reason for my not wanting to be insistent is that understanding is not the only goal of philosophy and, especially, of science – the values of science and philosophy are multimodal and include the tacit and the implicit… I have written on this elsewhere. Regarding my orientation I find that I there is a balance between intuition, experience and analysis – not a fixed one but a dynamic balance that changes with time and the need of the occasion and my cumulative experience and, no doubt, my personal orientation at the time. So, then, where does or should the balance between intuition and analysis lie? In the first place, although the philosophical spirit must be to include a critical attitude toward all things [in principle, and as a way to move forward – to relate the known to the unknown… and, not in general, merely or even primarily to be critical even though is the valid orientation of some individuals] it is also important to be secure in and at least accept that we know what we know. And, although there will be friction between the intuitively and the analytically known, it is at the border between the synthetic or the intuitive and the analytic that the dynamic balance lives and must play. Often, we here from someone talking about some important concept that “We all know what it is but when we come to describe or define it then we are at a loss.” Generally, the knowledge referred to in saying that “we all know what it is” is, roughly, comprised of two interactive aspects – the intuition and tacit knowledge of correct behavior regarding the concept e.g. time. Naturally, it does not follow that analytic expression of the concept in a universal context is easy or even possible; note that the difficulty is two-fold: analytic expression and universalization. Now, it does not follow that the intuition / tacit knowledge is inferior or should be abandoned or that individuals should stop behaving as though they know of what they talk; but this in turn does not imply that the intuition is universal with regard to context and precision. The limitations on the tacit do not require that it be replaced by the analytic. It also does not follow that the analytic is useless or should be avoided although it is understandable how the reaction against the analytic may come about especially when some analyst assumes a superior attitude or when someone else mistakes the analyst’s enthusiasm for superiority. Often in the history of ideas, what may start as esoteric analysis is found to be useful, to extend the intuition and becomes part of common intuition. Properly seen, the intuition and analysis interact and inform each other in the forward movement of understanding
The intuition of time is more than just the perception of time or the feeling that one is living in time or that time is passing or flowing. Here, intuition is used in Kant’s sense: it is not mere sensing, it is not anything like a hunch nor does it have anything to do with the rigorous vs. non-rigorous distinction and it is not a special sense that some develop especially well to see or sense things that others do not. Here, intuition is not any one of these valid but distinct meanings of the word “intuition.” Intuition in Kant’s sense are forms, primarily of perception, that structure or – speaking non-structurally – that give the world its special form or color as it appears; thus intuition here does not stand against thought, reason, description or science or logic but is continuous with them. The intuition of time is the sense of time that is required for the perception of time as it is perceived. What is the pure intuition of time? It is not clear that it is pure if that means that it is not influenced by mood, conception, pre-conception and that includes individual and cultural factors in addition to the biological ones. We may refer to the intuition of time as psychological time
This appears to have a number of features that are felt with more or less strength or conviction according to individual and culture. The features include the flow of time; the existence of past, present and future; a sense of unidirectionality [the arrow of time] associated with time e.g. that although it appears that most of the fundamental laws of physics i.e. excluding thermodynamics are reversible in time, events such as the scrambling differently colored sets of beads is irreversible… note that the sense of flow of time from future to present to past of the previous point is another but distinct arrow of time that is not referred to in this point; the feeling that time is linear or circular – which senses depend on the important phenomena of the life and culture of an individual and of which a special case is timelessness or the suspension of time… of course, sense of linearity, circularity and suspension may occur in the same individual and culture depending on the occasion or kinds of events that are held as important… and, further, the proclamations of an individual – even what the individual thinks about his or her experience – are distinct from though interactive with the actual experiences… while timelessness and circularity of time are more common in hunter-gatherer communities, even in modern societies there are the philosophies and attitudes of karma and of the eternal return; the sense of continuity or disjointedness of time; the common intuition, at least in western culture that time and space are distinct and are vehicles or containers for events and objects; finally, there is the intuition that prior events cause future ones [this is not only notion of cause even in physics as in e.g. force causing motion]
This is the time of the physical world. In order to have a coherent concept of physical time it is necessary to have a coherent and self-contained theory of physical processes and it will help if the theory is universal… of course, a number of the great dynamical theories of physics have been held to be universal and that is natural because it is part of the greatness of the theories that they are more or less co-extensive with the universe of the known with the natural exceptions that regard phenomena whose level or mode of description is alien to the mode of the physical theory even if all objects are physical objects… note that it is this very co-extensivity that encourages the implicit belief that all objects are physical but this is illicit since it is the same co-extensivity that makes it impossible to see [clearly] beyond the universe of the conceptual and the empirical of an era… clearly not all objects are physical in the classical sense but regarding the modern sense [quantum and relativistic] there is no way to clearly and positively see beyond that from within modern culture. The first coherent and self-contained theory of physical processes was the mechanics of Isaac Newton. Newton provided a metaphysics of time and space as independent and absolute containers for objects and events: I refer to the Scholium of Newton’s Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy where he begins with the famous words, “Absolute, true and mathematical time, of itself, and from is own nature, flows equably without relation to anything external… ” Newton continued with a discussion of relative time that is not “true” time and continued to describe absolute or true space and relative space and absolute or true and relative motion. Although he was criticized by Leibniz, Newton argues cogent reasons for his pronouncements. The concept of time of Newton lends to conceiving time as absolute [which has two meanings: independent of observers and independent of events,] flowing, linear, continuous and reversible. It is in common observation and then in classical thermodynamics that time has an arrow: cream is mixed into coffee but is never seen to un-mix. The theory of statistical mechanics [developed largely by Boltzmann and based in Newtonian Mechanics] explains this in molecular terms: if the velocities of the molecules of the universe were reversed events would “go backwards” but finding the world in such a state of reversed velocities would imply that actually highly improbable distributions are highly probable… however, there is a result of Henri Poincare that suggests that dynamical systems will ultimately return [sufficiently closely] to their original state and the resolution of the paradox is that the theories that rule out such return are probabilistic – the probability of return is staggeringly low in “typical” amounts of time but not so given unlimited or very large amounts of time… thus, in a sense, and given the assumptions of Poincare’s result, time is circular. Is there causation in the sense of a prior event causing a later one, or of a force causing change? Such ascriptions of cause are possible but not necessary in physics; the notion of cause can be eliminated from physics but is also a useful heuristic principle. Thus the intuition of cause is not inconsistent with physics but is important to the individual due to the importance of agency that is not part of the language of physics but is validly part of the language of individuals – provided that the individual does not want to universalize [project] his or her experience. Is time a continuum? It is known that modern physics does not tell us what happens at intervals less than the Planck time of about 10-43 seconds and so it cannot be asserted on the basis of modern physics that for sufficiently short intervals, between every two instants there is another [a necessary condition for a continuum.] Is time independent of observers? From the theory of relativity it is not. However, in the theory of relativity, each “particle” that is sufficiently localized appears to have its own time that, within factors that depend on the forces, i.e. the effect of the entire universe, on it, is synchronized with every other particle [this permits, consistent with modern physics, a form of “time travel” that is measurable for particles but not practical for most significant effects for the lives of human beings.] Does time flow? Modern physics describes no flow of time. However, it appears that there are at least two metaphors for or intuitions of flow [1] as in the flow of a river and [2] as in the passing of time; and perhaps the latter is secondary but not therefore “invalid.” Much confusion is generated by conflating the metaphors; beyond that, intuition of the flow of time is indistinct from the intuition of change but this distinction is sometimes made in use. The intuitive argument that there is no flow of time but only a sequence of instants applies also to the flow of a river: there is a sequence of positions but no actual flow; however, the equations of physics that are formulated in terms of states can usually be reformulated in terms of “fluxes.” The question of “flow” is not as interesting as other issues of time
According to Newton time and space are absolute. Even in classical physics, however, that time and change are or seem to be inextricably interwoven; it is true, though, that in classical mechanics arbitrarily stretching time makes the equations of mechanics more complex. In Einstein’s theory of gravitation space, time and matter are bound together as dynamic variables suggesting that the existence of spacetime is precisely as contingent as the existence of matter. This lends to the idea that spacetime is relational and not substantial; however, an interesting aspect of the history of physics is that often what starts as a descriptive or mathematical device is later found to have or becomes imbued with physical reality. A problem for a relational concept of spacetime [I am not sure why the term relational theory is used] is the putative existence of space and time where there are no actual objects without which even though there may be time there is no sign or measure of it. This is countered by positing possible objects or events. However, it is consistent with the notion of slack concepts / indeterminate objects that there are indeterminacies in spacetime; however, given how tightly woven our world appears to be such indeterminacy in our phase-epoch of the universe seems to be unlikely except at distances and times less than the Planck length and time. However, the absence of obviously material objects in a region of spacetime does not imply an absence of physical things: there are ubiquitous fields of force; there is the quantum vacuum… Below the Planck length and time or outside our phase-epoch there may be indeterminacies and discontinuities in spacetime [1] at least consistent with modern physics and [2] as real: this possibility is founded in the general cosmology of Journey in Being
“General” is distinguished from “physical.” In Journey in Being, the cosmology conveniently starts with nothingness that is an actual nothingness and bears little relation to the nothingness of Sartre or the no-thing of Heidegger that are word plays, psychological ploys and very superficially artifactual. Alternative terms are void and nothing – since in the state of nothingness there is no distinction between object and property but note the distinction between nothing and no-thing; other terms are the emptiness, the abyss of being [a little too metaphorical to be sufficiently neutral,] the Greek letter f pronounced “phi,” and the zero-state. In the void there is no being, no causation and no law. This follows if causation and law are thought of as modes of being but also since in the presence of law and causation there is not nothing. The vacuum of quantum physics is understood by removing objects in a thought experiment but not the laws themselves; the void is obtained by removing, similarly, not just objects but also the laws. That is rather artificial if we think of law and object as interwoven. We may distinguish Law and law; Law is what obtains e.g. the patterns and relations among events and objects; law is a reading and expression of Law. Incidentally Logos may be thought of as the possibilities of [forms] of being i.e. of Law. Now, clearly, Law is not at all like the laws of the statutes and of courts that are imposed. Law is not imposed but is, rather, as much the being of the universe or a phase-epoch thereof as its events and objects; Law is as much object as concrete objects. Therefore in removing all things to obtain the void we must also remove law and causation. This is not the vacuum of quantum physics in which the potential to become is based in the laws of quantum physics. There are, however, similarities. Since the void has no Law, no causation there are no limits except logical limits. Therefore, at once the void is equivalent to every possible state of being. Can the void exist? Provided care is taken to avoid contradiction it is not ruled out by logic. Thus the void exists is present with every particle of the universe [particle & void = particle] and, being without, limits may annihilate the particle; the entire phase-epoch, the entire universe may be annihilated. This is not an existential problem since being as we know it [and as we do not] is equivalent to and shows from the void. It is not a practical problem either for the being of our phase-epoch has the stability that makes it continue to exist; of course, annihilation is possible but from stability it is extremely improbable. However, there must be shadow worlds whose existence is ephemeral – worlds that do not even interact with ours [the probability of interaction is extremely, even colossally small] but that pass through ours and are passing through ours; and there must “be” worlds and forms of being that integrate forms [perhaps we are already integrated as we breath parts of the universe in and out.] We saw that the void co-exists with the universe and is also the residue when there is no being. Paradoxes arising from there being no being but there being the void are word play. Starting from these origins, Journey in Being shows how a world [phase-epoch] such as ours may arise from the void i.e. from within the heart of the universe as it exists. The integration of a phase-epoch and the coalescing of multiple disjointed times into one dominant time [that is the basis of thermodynamic and psychological time] is shown. “Time” in the foregoing may be replaced by spacetime or space-time-matter. Thus physical time may be linear, continuous [at scales above Planck’s,] and primarily singular in our world but is circular and more complex, disjointed and plural in general i.e. in the universe-at-large from which our world comes… In general spacetimematter [being] is slack/indeterminate-in-degrees but receives relative determination in a phase-epoch such as ours
I.e. of spacetimematter… we have not made specific reference to the philosophy of spacetimematter but have already covered as much of it as we need to provide a platform for a more detailed and tighter development
There are various paradoxes associated with the idea that time is continuous. Most of these are associated with the Greek philosopher, Zeno of Elea c. 445 BC. The paradoxes are interesting and significant to the development of western thought especially the concepts of the continuum and of the limit process and summation of infinite series in mathematical analysis [calculus.] I will not discuss the paradoxes here because they have long since been resolved with exacting rigor using the ideas centering around those just mentioned
Given the filling of the universe with being, even in the laws of our phase-epoch, spacetime may be thought of as material [regarding process as material] i.e. a parametrization of being. However, given that all being-as-known begins, in the life of an individual as distinct from the life of his or her population, everything-as-known [there is no ultimate distinction from everything] is projection [individual to world / world to individual] and any distinction of relational vs. absolute, of description vs. actual must break down. We have gotten away with discussing things without defining them
The foundation is the history of my own thought as recorded in Journey in Being where I have, I believe, gone significantly beyond anything that I have read. I have spent much time immersed in the modern culture of ideas. The excellent article, Time [Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy], has been a source of some of the major topics of concern in the modern philosophy of time
…or Cosmology of the World
As noted in Characteristics of Being, ‘Actual’ is a generalization of ‘material’
The purpose of actual cosmology is to bring remote truth within practical access. Thus, while all being is ‘normally’ colossally remote to e.g. an individual human being, actual cosmology would make the ‘colossally remote’ merely ‘accessibly remote’
Actual Cosmology includes physical cosmology and the physical sciences – for physics and cosmology are not ultimately separate. An approach to actual cosmology may be through physical cosmology or some point on a continuum between general and physical cosmologies
[See The Constitution of Being is a Result of its Becoming]
Creation from the void, perhaps together with the trivial but powerful, existential principle that what exists is possible implies
Constraints on dynamics
An array of possible dynamics
Conversely, dynamics may give us information on creation; more specifically, the dynamics of this phase-epoch may give clues as to its creation
From the foundations in nothingness does it follow that all actual being will be material even if matter is rather different than in our phase-epoch? The question is not fully intelligible! From the notion that matter is a slack concept and a mode of description it appears likely that in any actual phase-epoch of being, there will be a material phase [of description.] Similarly, there will always be a mental phase… but [1] the mental and physical are alternate modes of description of the same object and do not refer to different objects or substances and [2] existence of high level matter and mind e.g. animals or higher is not guaranteed. What is prerequisite for the higher levels? Does high level mind necessitate some minimum material form, complexity, variety and so on?
What is intermediate between the void and actual [manifest] being? Form! It may be useful to review G. Spencer Brown, Laws of Form, 1969 and © 1972
The foundations of physical science: the following levels of generality / abstraction [ordered more to less] interact
Nothingness
Form
Laws of Form [form of form]
Range of cosmologies and physics [plural]
Physics of this phase-epoch of the universe
In the prologue I assert that the foundation of being in the void also provides a foundation for cosmology and physics. The nature of the foundation needs to be clarified somewhat. At minimum, it should be explained that the foundation is in principle
How would a foundation for the physics of this phase-epoch result i.e. what minimum information / assumption would result in our physics?
Consider adaptation as mutually sustainable relation
Add a section perhaps after §1.6.13 Cosmology, called “Adaptation and Evolution” [or something similar] that will include a discussion of life and, perhaps, incorporate Life in the title of the section. The following topics and ideas will be included:
Every entity or system is – as it is – in mutual adaptation with its environment. The entities and systems under consideration may be elementary particles, galaxies, solar systems, suns, bacteria, animals, organs… The environment of a system or entity includes all other systems or entities with which the original system or entity interacts [and with which it can enter into interaction?] The fact that I may identify my environment as including other human beings and animals rather than a set of eyes, arms, legs, organs and so on will have to do with the level of description and interest. Adaptation does not necessarily include any notion of perfection
As I have noted elsewhere, the idea of evolution is [among other things] an organizing principle: considering the environment as it is, evolution [along with the idea of common origins] gives us understanding of the environment and its various systems
To what degree can a considered account of mutual adaptation give understanding? In the account, adaptation will replace “evolution” and mutual interaction will replace “common origins.” The purpose of such an account is not to eliminate evolution or common origins as principles of understanding but to enhance understanding with additional principles. The account may be useful in providing an additional way of seeing; a way to avoid using the term “evolution” and its problematic connotations; and, therefore, a way of justifying evolution – since / if evolution and adaptation provide the same results. Regardless, it seems to me that a complete adaptational account will require reference to all characters: physiological, behavioral, mental, molecular and to all levels of grouping: particle – molecule, tissue and cell, organ, system, individual, group, species… and, likely, in the end, will require introduction of an ordering parameter that will be the basis of comparison of the different characters and groupings and that will turn out to be [equivalent to] time and the groupings along the axis of the ordering parameter will be not other than those found in the evolutionary series
The section will be the representative of Evolution and Design and Evolution, Design and the Absolute in Journey in Being
Whereas the section on human life emphasizes the physical and biological, this section emphasizes experience or psychology and society
Sociology
Social groups and peoples, society as community, populations, distributions and nations
Culture and its components; symbol and communication – language and languages of the world, names, speech and writing
Social organization and change
…and basis in the nature of human being… and the world i.e. In freedom and limitation
Political philosophy, political theory and institutions
Relationship between individual aspiration and freedom and society
Also see Technology; Machines
While these eight topics deserve separate treatment from the human centered view, they are properly placed here from a metaphysical-cosmological perspective
The reasons for placement here are [1] to include a brief treatment of the most basic fundamentals and the logic of their place within cosmology and metaphysics – this rounds out the metaphysics and is suggestive for it; [2] as part of the intent to show where the various elements of an encyclopaedic formulation may be placed
Mind and Its Metaphysics will be placed at some point after the sections on being and on cosmology –tentatively, it will be the third topic of Division 1– and will contain all developments on mind and consciousness or experience. I will note that it is not necessary to refer to mind show how reference to experience [and, perhaps, will or attitude] is sufficient and how that might be an advantage in light of the history of counter-productive associations of the idea of mind e.g. mind as object, mind-body dualism; it will not be necessary, however, to eliminate the word “mind.” Additionally the treatment of mind will be enhanced by setting it in a categorial framework
This is well developed in Journey in Being, in the present document [including notes to be incorporated]
The interest is conceptual and not merely actual atomism; and the application here is to atomism in mental function
Wittgenstein wrote on this, especially in Tractacus Logico-Philosophicus
What are consequences of atomism versus anatomism? For and as inferred from
Neurological development
Integration in society and world
Add comments on atomism to §1.6.13.8 Item 3
In a continuum, every element may contain structure. Therefore, every element may have some time associated with it; and, every element may have interactions with other elements that are due to the structure of the element and require no interactivity pasted on in an ad hoc way
Every appearance of atomism can be the result of a continuum – as is known by analogy from the theory of eigenvalues [a particular case of which is the theory of vibrations in continuous media] and quantum mechanics. Similarly, cannot every appearance of anatomism be the result of an atomism? This is not clear for the essence of atomism is in two parts [1] discreteness which can be the manifestation of a continuum, and [2] the existence of a smallest material unit which stands in contradiction to anatomism. It is possible to give up [2] and conceive material reality as a system of particles where every particle has sub-particles
However, the continuum description seems to be most fundamental because, first, it requires no special assumption of sub-structure and, second, it is more general and includes atomistic descriptions and manifestations as a special case
Especially clarify the distinctions: continuum vs. discretum | atomism vs. anatomism vs. holism | and the nature of interaction
On reflection, the distinction between continuum and discrete distributions is false for an atom can be seen as a distribution with zero-density in places where the atom is not. Thus atomism per se is not a particularly enlightening or interesting hypothesis i.e. in a given phase-epoch of the universe it may turn out that there are true “atoms” i.e. indivisibles but that is a posteriori rather than a priori. If therefore, we think of atomism as the existence of possibly compound elements of matter there is no fundamental distinction between atomism and continuum for within each atom there may be sub-atoms
The existence of fields and laws is a form of holism co-existing with atoms. We thus begin to suspect and see the falseness of the distinctions noted above
Generally, in Journey in Being, any dependence on one form of the distinctions or on some mythology or on modern science or theoretical physics is, as far as general or universal considerations are concerned, only for purposes of illustration or for heuristic derivation of conclusions. The universal conclusions, however, are not dependent on the particular “assumptions” for they would go through without them. The easiest way to see this is from the falseness of the distinctions
§1.6.6.6 | 8.29.03: add comments on mind / body and atomism
Clarify the discussion as it stands especially with respect to its not being dependent on the completeness or completability of physics i.e. that the use of a hypothetical complete physics is an artifact of argument; add a comment to the effect that although the discussion emphasizes atomistic physics, it would go through in the more general material case of anatomism / continuum and even a holism
The purpose of the quotes is that I want to talk about the possibility and values of such elimination and that we will find that after all it is not necessary to eliminate the word provided that certain misuses are avoided. It is also interesting to show how, theoretically, the concept may be eliminated even though such elimination does not at all mean that mind does not exist. The value of considering such elimination is that it sheds light on: the nature of mind, certain [egregious] errors – especially the dualistic cut in the chain of relationship and causation – that arise from the use of ‘mind,’ the relationship between / root identity of mind and matter
[I think I have written on this elsewhere, perhaps in notes from J2003 or notes in the margins of Journey in Being or, perhaps in Journey in Being itself; if so, I will perform the necessary integration when I locate the other notes]
Mind is associated with various problems because of its connotations: as an object it encouraged the idea of a mind/body split; as passive it encourages a distinction among experience, attitude and action – not that such a distinction is fully false but it is an exaggeration and is also subject to the distinction of mind/body. Perhaps we can talk of idea [experience; or perhaps attitude] and will [the source of physical action] and see these as located in the noumenon
Then clearly experience has the attitude / idea distinction but we can replace that by experience / idea where, in the latter use, experience is more specialized and includes the connotation of attitude but also includes non-attitudinal experience
Experience must be differentiated as bound and free; organismic and environmental and so the origin of perception, cognition and feeling and inner sense. Feeling combines with cognition etc. to form the complex concept of emotion; humor, with its dual basis in the organism and in freedom orients the organism to the unpredictable. The bound, free distinction to will results in drive and judgment / choice. Further analysis follows, now, as in Journey in Being
An enhancement to the Schopenhauerian categories of cause, space and time is to consider the following primitive categories and forms: object [object-as-experienced,] cause [and effect: will and idea,] space [extension,] time [duration,] indeterminism [or inherent unpredictability, and void; humor] and the forms: feeling, icon and symbol; these need to be reflected upon and, possibly, revised. Simple object-hood, cause, space, time and indeterminism are relatively fixed intuitions and their power is their immediacy; the forms are also intuitions but their power is the freedom of combination and recombination. The power of intuition is identical to its being an expression of adaptation. The power of the forms is due to the fact that, at least to a significant degree, the world [starting from the void] and the combination / recombination of forms follow the LOGOS [logos1, logos2.] Note regarding space-time: since physical bodies may be thought of as standing waves of the fundamental fields, the Einstein-Minkowski unification of space and time, the contraction of lengths and dilation of time and various other relativistic phenomena follow
It may be useful to revise the discussion of mind in Journey in Being without reference to mind i.e. note that we are talking of mind but without using the idea
It will also be useful to rewrite the section on being to incorporate the void; to reorganize the discussion of “mind” according to the above categories, noting their basis in elementary being and the void, the noumenon and, also, the elements of “first being” that are closest to the void among actual entities
What is Mind? I.e. experience [+ i.e. see Journey in Being and treatment of categories above;] and generalization to substrate of being
Nature of mind [previous point] and nature of plant, animal, human mind
Modes of experience
A System of Categories of Intuition of Understanding Will Form a Framework for the Organization of the Study of Mind. The starting point will be the Kantian system as modified by Schopenhauer: time, space and causal relationship
That the Kant-Schopenhauerian System is an Excellent Start but Fundamentally Inadequate in that the Individual Faces Unpredictability and Thwarting of Motives. Introduction of Humor… or of Creativity or the Understanding of Unpredictability. That the Philosophical Ideal of Knowledge as Unconditioned and Eternal Even if Limited to the Categories of Experience-Intuition [Kant; and so the in-Apprehensibility of the Noumenon] is Limited on a Knower-Known or Representational Concept of Knowledge i.e. on an Object-Interaction Metaphysics; that on this Metaphysics the Hypothetico-Deductive-Corrective Model From Science is a Better, if not the, Model for Philosophy that Inheres in the Nature of Knowledge as an Part of Being. On a Relation or Interaction as Object Metaphysics, Knowledge May be Unconditioned and Eternal[?]… and the Noumenon is Known or, More Accurately, Perception as-Individuals-have-it Generalizes, without any absurd forms of Pan-Psychism, to Perception at an Elementary Level of Being and not Merely Knowing and this Perception is Noumenon which Includes perception:
The Schopenhauerian scheme may be modified to object and cause, provided that object is interpreted as including process [this will have significance for being-as-such for although, on the Kant-Schopenhauerian account, we cannot directly know a time-space like manifold to be the or a manifold of being we cannot know them to not be such a manifold; if, then, it is possible to speak intelligibly of being-as-such e.g. in a hypothetico-deductive-corrective mode, time-space like manifolds of objects may be found to be useful.] However, the theory of being developed earlier will show that creation is, at root, indeterministic; and, once the trajectory of being is in place e.g. as in a domain-epoch of the one universe [the use of the redundant “one” is occasioned by the fact that uses of “universe” have come to ignore the significance of the prefix “uni,” but perhaps the point can be made by writing uni-verse] the process [see Journey in Being for details including justification of the argument] may evolve into causal, even deterministic like pockets or levels of phenomena, but at root remains and continues to include the indeterministic
Now, the process of discovery – and more generally of experience – is, in broad outline, completely analogous to this in two ways: first in the adjustments that the individual must make in face of the unpredictable and, second, in the existence of true novelty in discovery – which novelty is essential for new knowledge and newness in knowledge is essential to the existence of knowledge given that e.g. five billion years ago there was no human or animal knowledge at all. What element in human experience corresponds to adjustment to the unpredictable?
A number of human faculties permit adjustment including grief, anger and humor but of these, humor is fundamental in that, whereas anger and grief permit psychological adjustment, humor is the aspect that is the direct representation of the unpredictable. Of course, in the present sense, humor is understood in a general and not completely specified sense – one to be elaborated – and such phenomena as wit, laughter, jokes are physiological / secondary manifestations. In the general sense, humor also includes creation. Here, then, humor is not defined by listing a set of examples [wit, being funny, jokes, comedy…] or concepts [see Journey in Being] or physiological characteristics [release, relaxation, laughter, crying…] but by stating the category to which it corresponds: humor is the direct representation in the individual –the organism and his or her symbols– of the unpredictable or the indeterministic… As introduced here, ‘humor’ is a concept but its categorical aspect is more significant than the conceptual aspect; ‘humor’ is not a concept whose object is simply a fact or phenomenon or a domain of facts or phenomena. Due to the visceral connotations of ‘humor’ another word, more general, that includes the visceral but, at the same time more general might be better – what are some such alternative, more appropriate, words? Two possible alternatives are ‘creation’ or ‘creativity’ and ‘perceiving.’ The three words, ‘humor,’ ‘create,’ and open ‘perception’ are functionally related. However, the response of humor – in the general sense – underlies the others, underlies a greater range of response to the world; it includes contexts that call for response and contexts that do not – that call for acceptance but not active acceptance, not an effort to accept but, rather, reorientation to the unexpected, the new; and, here, then the creation of an environment of humor of which one manifestation is the joking environment. For the present, I retain ‘humor.’ Therefore the categories are some combination such as: time, space, cause and humor – and note that cause includes the idea of cause and effect which, in the Schopenhauerian way of thinking, translate into will and idea or representation; or object, cause and humor; and perhaps, as already noted, an alternate word to humor would be a more effective choice. The introduction of the category of humor [indeterminism] as balance to that of cause has the following moment: the Kant-Schopenhauerian categories represent roughly one half of the categories of interrelationship and interaction in the world; here ‘half’ is qualitative; numerically, the pertinent value is greater or less than 0.5 as conditions approach or recede from nascency
Now, in relation to the system of categories, some interesting and extremely significant considerations arise as follows. The considerations are significant in their consequences and implications and also since they correct some mistakes regarding the understanding of the noumenon including some deep mistakes of Kant and Schopenhauer that continue to be repeated and quoted. The first issue concerns knowledge of the noumenon. Recollect that the categories are categories of [human] understanding that are inherent in the forms that the [human] individual brings to the understanding of the world; therefore, while space and time inhere in understanding they cannot be immediately be said to inhere in the world-in-itself. The traditional argument is that they do not inhere rather than that they cannot be said to inhere. The traditional argument is buoyed by the fact that behind immediate everyday appearances lie e.g. scientific ‘reality’ e.g. atoms, space-time rather than space and time and so on and that behind present scientific ‘reality’ may lie further under-standing…
However, there are a variety of ways in which the noumenon may be known. In the traditional metaphysics the noumenon, the thing-as-such is not known directly in the way we know the world-as-known; rather, it is inferred… or it may be understood as the entire [one] uni-verse. What of the details of the noumenon? The traditional argument is that since space and time are categories of the [human] intuition, they cannot inhere in the noumenon; that since distinction is of the understanding we cannot tell whether the noumenon is one or many; that since distinction is in space and time and those are categories of understanding, the noumenon is undifferentiated. In the first place we cannot say that the categories do not inhere in the noumenon or that the noumenon is undifferentiated; only that we cannot directly know these things. We cannot tell directly whether the noumenon is one or many. Space and time may well be involved in descriptions of [phases of] the noumenon and so differentiation; it is likely, though that our categorical understanding of space and time may be incomplete and, of course in light of relativity and the implication of the Heisenberg principle for the graininess of space and time, it is near certain that it is incomplete even within the realm of this phase-epoch of the universe
How will understanding of the noumenon arise? First, the understanding of the void from Journey in Being has implications. Second, the hypothetico-deductive-corrective approach may be applied. But it may be asked, after all, whether any such real knowledge that is obtained is not limited, as Kant argued, by what is knowable in experience [and this includes, essentially, what may be inferred from what is knowable in experience.] However, consider scientific knowledge: it is not ‘known’ in the sense that it is in experience or the necessary consequence of what is known in experience. It may then be said that science does not provide a model for knowledge as understood by Kant: that which is unconditionally known; even if the knowledge lies within the framework of the categories of intuition or understanding, it is, as such, unconditional. In return it is necessary to ask whether this is the necessary model of knowledge in philosophy; unconditional and therefore eternal; it might be if being were of the same mold… but being is not and, therefore, for a being from this phase-epoch of the uni-verse in that infinitely infinite universe, where what may become is infinite in potential even relative to an infinite present it is a serious error to think that unconditional knowledge is the ideal of a finite being
But, beyond this, far beyond this but also before it in simplicity is what follows from the observation that the act of perception is within the noumenon. The idea of knowledge as pertaining to the object but not fully of the object because being also of the categories is based on a metaphysics of objects; in Journey in Being it was seen how this leads quickly to positing, for lack of proof in this metaphysics of anything more, of the Cartesian dualism and how the way out of the dualism is to recognize perception to be made up of an accumulation over elementary interactions. Similarly, here, we may see knowledge as relationship, and relationship as object and so knowledge as in-itself rather than knowledge as knowledge-of. In the history of knowledge [science] the following scenario has been played over and over: start with objects, find relationships; then: relationships are found to be objects; and, then, in modern physics this is no longer a fact but a principle: the object-relationship distinction loses its absolute character. So: perception, knowledge seen as an interactive loop –regarding whose necessity vast argumentation has accumulated from Evolution and Design through Journey in Being– are part of noumenon; alternatively noumenon may be seen as Perception [including Knowledge.] And Perception as the system of elements of universal being includes perception [knowledge] that constitutes [a phase of] individual being. It is essential to note that it is not being said that individual perception or its elements constitute all being, the uni-verse – that is an unnecessary and artificial pan-psychism; rather, the elements of Perception that constitute the uni-verse include the elements of matter and perception that constitute individual being [in e.g. this phase-epoch of the uni-verse]
… This too is a mode of talking –of description– but a highly illuminating one, one that unifies phenomenon and noumenon; and it does not rule out the other modes of description in which noumenon and phenomenon are split and the utilities of those other modes of description; however it does show that absolutization or universalization of the split modes to be in error and to have erroneous consequences. In addition to practical consequences there is the fundamental erroneous consequence that being finds –or feels– itself to be permanently and necessarily fractured
Developed adequately in Journey in Being
Note that the organization and treatment of the functions [and knowledge] is significantly impacted and improved [qualitatively also] by the inclusion of and understanding from the categories; this is a significant new development
This is a point to possibly include 1.6.12 Theories of Action of the current version
Add the following distinctions for emotion to the sections on mind and its dimensions
Felt emotion, emotional economy and congruence to reality [which, naturally, involves cognition;] expressed emotion, emotional economy / ecology and congruence to feeling
Range, fluidity and intensity as parameters of feeling-emotion; and as determinants of mood
The variety of perceptual modes [sight, sound…] correspond to [or are a practical subset of] the system of effects in the environment; do something similar for emotion-feeling as the perception of internal states
A source for the previous point was the consideration of the variety of mental disturbance and its basis in the variety of mental function
List such sources i.e. principles of thought about the variety of mental function; for example another principle is the free / bound distinction and its origin and logic
Apply to cognition
Further consider implications for variety of mental function / disorder
Human relationships: merges with social theory, politics
Sex
[The following repeats the section of the same name from Foundation]
The finiteness of the number of modalities of knowing is based on the following distinctions:
Organism and world i.e. the organism is part of the world; apprehension of the world by the organism is in terms of the categories
The categories have an immanent character
Direction of reference; world includes organism therefore directions of reference include organism-organism and senses are not limited to the conventional sense organs and include the diffuse and the internal such as body sensation including feeling and kinesthetic sense; there is also the ‘null’ direction. It is pointed out, above, that even this apparently null direction is an internal directionality for in the unitary case no experience is [possible]
The sensory modalities are a subset of physical modalities: fundamental or aggregate
The bound versus free distinction; thus perception-cognition, drive-feeling-emotion etc
The ‘free’ aspects of mental function are combination and recombination of images, remembered elements, of the bound. Thus every thought is novel; what varies is the degree, complexity and significance of the novelty – and, simultaneously, no thought, no flight of fantasy ever gets altogether out of the world even in its reference
The integration of the different sensa that constitute –the image of– an object is discussed in the sources; the essence of that discussion is that, in cognition, objects have a fundamental character in balance with a degree of cognitive dissociation –in the nature of the case, as required for freedom but to excess in pathology– and that the analysis into sensa as fundamental is the assumption of analysis… [this is a resolution of the binding problem, now seen to be somewhat artificial, of how the different attributes of an object are bound together as one in perception; the discussion also illuminates how an object is seen as now whole and now made up of parts or attributes]
The bound aspects may be regarded as ‘rooting’ or ‘grounding’ in the world; the ‘free’ as the basis of an ability to form ‘worlds’ i.e. worlds of imagination, and through imagination of culture and civilization – in balance with selection; and, from the law of contradiction and related principles it is clear that mind may be involved in the creation of actual cosmological systems even though the contribution of human mind to the structure present cosmological system may be abysmal for normal purposes
It is essential for knowledge, judgment and morals –ethics– that there be a degree of integration between the free and bound aspects of function. Stated alternatively, while functional disengagement or dissociation is good, absolute disconnection impossible for a viable organism. Ramifications are manifold and many commonplace e.g. connection between emotional integrity and functional intelligence, integration of feeling in morals, relation between disorder and creative function. The human world is such that only a fraction of ‘effort’ is required to be spent on necessity i.e. on survival etc. When the individual is functionally integrated –concepts are wholes, balance between bound and free function– there is no flight of thought that is ‘insane’ at least because the potentially insane is grounded as an aspect of the integration
The afferent versus efferent distinction; action as the implementation of judgment [the afferent-efferent distinction is causal whereas direction of reference is semantic or logical]
Commentary: In viewing the modalities as finite in number, like items –e.g. the different colors– are grouped together as one kind. The finiteness of the number of physical modalities is or may be contingent to our world in a number of ways in addition to grouping of kinds; at root the elements may well form a continuum even if practically, in our world, they are finite and discrete.
[The following repeats the section of the same name from Foundation]
Objective: together with the foregoing, to provide a basis for the elaboration of understanding and description –inclusive of theory– of mind
Symbols, language, logic, and knowledge
Structure and intensity or cognition and feeling. The objective is to permit a completion and elaboration of the classical functions – cognition, emotion and motivation
The modes of cognition as the modes of the world – local and universal – and body e.g. the ‘five’ senses for the world and the ‘inner’ senses
The bound-free continuum: a bound state is determined by the ‘source’ state and is typical of perception, drives and primitive emotion; free states are typical of imagination, thought, choice, judgment and, to some degree, emotions that are not strongly connected to survival [the degree to which emotions are free is a function of biology e.g. the pathological case of extreme emotional instability, individual development which may amplify or attenuate the physiological propensity, and cultivation]
Modularity
Aspects of modularity are evident: cognition vs. emotion; these however interact in that cognition is not pure cognition and emotion not pure emotion but each colored by the other and essentially so in so far as there nature, experience and adequate function
The ‘five senses’ are clearly modular. However, it is important to note that: the ‘eyes’ though obviously and conventionally distinct from ‘brain’ are not essentially distinct – the eyes and brain are an integral system in thinking that mind is rooted in the brain. More generally, in this sense, ‘brain’ includes ‘body’ and any logical extensions that it may have
Layering
The functions e.g. autonomic function, emotion, cognition in there primitive and pure senses are ‘layered.’ However, in the organism these have necessarily integrated aspects of function even while they remain distinct
Structured organism is grounded i.e. ‘built’ up from the elements: layers upon layers – elements, molecules, primitive structures, cells, interactive communities…
In contrast to machines and primitive artificial intelligence, organism is ‘non-flat,’ built up hierarchically from the elements
And the ‘function’ of actual organisms, in contrast to that of machines and primitive artificial intelligence or artificial life, is intrinsic and not imposed or assigned
Memory
Memory is important as a store of information. However, there is a fundamental aspect to memory in the capacity for self-awareness, identity, reflexive experience, the ability have imagery [thought] which is always creative
Direction of subject-object relation: propositional and other attitudes
Time and development – including learning, personality and commitment
In light of this treatment it is now advantageous to loop back to and elaborate and improve the treatment of being and elaborate it and distinguish the human [and other particular cases] from the general: the general treatment of being may receive illumination, clarification, elaboration and, perhaps, conceptual sharpening, generalization and improvement – the process is iterative; this iterative process also applies to knowledge. It is not necessary to show the details of the iteration; the final result, mention of the principle and process of iteration, some examples –perhaps a key example– of how it works and results may be sufficient
Note: this topic may be treated here and/or in the topic ‘Knowledge,’ next
Concepts and slack; importance of this point; alternate word for slack
Tightening of ‘slack’ so far as it is realistic may be by elaborating the kinds
Bound / bound-free [related to the illicit or at least illicitly used distinction or wide and free content]
With / without memory… is memory necessary to mind and, if so, to what aspects
Kinds of environmental stimuli
Note: this topic may be treated here and/or in the topic ‘Knowledge,’ next
Belief / attitude = |a> & |b> &…
Integrate
Dictum against logical contradiction
Basis in quantum theory / void
Neoteny is delayed development; the young remains undeveloped, immature for a longer period of time. The dual significance: greater potential; and greater time and potential for acculturation and therefore greater possibility of cultural [extra-genetic] transmission… the very possibility of culture-as-we-know it
It is common to compare male and female and find one or other ‘superior.’ Here, in the west, the finders used to be male and they found themselves to be superior; now, c. 1980 – 2000 AD, it is politically incorrect for males to be finders at all and correct for females to be finders and the exceptions are, for a male who finds females superior and for a female who finds males superior
The notion of absolute superiority is meaningless
Each sex is ‘superior’ in some things: males at fathering, females at mothering; the list may proliferate but is not important except, of course, that in light of a history of male domination it is good for women –all being– to find justifiable equality and have real pride
Why two sexes? Differential function [division of labor…] and integrated function [genetic recombination] and from both points of view superiority has no meaning
The important aspect to this section: the tasks of the sexes are different and together constitute a whole; this remains true despite leveling which is good
The female is genetically more stable due to a double complement of sex-chromosomes. This is one reason for greater male infant death; but, for the same reason, males have more variability. The normal distribution for characters is flatter for males; thus more males populate the extreme ranges e.g. males are better at impersonating and appearing like females – at the extreme of the distribution of masculinity among males. In the politically correct climate of today it is incorrect to suggest that males have more extremes of intelligence but this may be inferred. It is a recurrence of the old idea that strength and weakness are often the same character
Males develop later than females; perhaps because, during evolution, the developmental tasks for males were more complex. Males have a longer period of development and hard-wired learning; a possible inference is a greater capacity to learn but, perhaps, for secondary reasons, a diminished capacity for empathy
The topic has been treated in Journey in Being and in Problems of Consciousness; from the point of view of Journey in Being it is not fundamental. Yet, there are even theoretically useful considerations as with the relation to the categories. The following is a collection of some points that are significant and define or enhance the more complete / systematic accounts in the references linked
The concept of disorder: We are not concerned with normal / abnormal. A pragmatic definition of disorder is that the ‘syndrome’ [or episodes of exacerbation] involves a combination of features similar to the following: “marked or clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational or other important areas of functioning or to require hospitalization to prevent harm to the individual or others.” That a base in social function is used to mark a disorder does not mean that treatment [diagnosis] is an instrument of ‘social control’ although, of course, treatment may be social control. The point hinges, in the first place, on the meaning of ‘control’ and second, whether the controls in question include or emphasize the ‘negative.’ The issue of treatment being a form of control becomes ethically significant only to the extent that ‘negative’ control is an option or in articulating what is positive treatment. But this meaning of control is empty, has no actual application, without some articulated system of value. The issue of control would not be taken up here if the question did not have an ethical dimension and if it had not been a social issue [The West, c. 2000.] Often, critics argue that treatment is an instrument of control in the sense that treatment is, necessarily, a social instrument but having made the conclusion use control in an ethical sense e.g. treatment as subversion of individual value to social ends. While this is, no doubt, invariably present to some degree it is not inherent in the nature of treatment but rather in the everyday balance of ‘good and evil’
Disorders Have Biological Dimensions: the pragmatic definition above should not be taken to mean that disorders are ‘epiphenomenal.’ Most disorders have some biological basis in manifestation or cause. But, even if physical reduction were valid in principle its impracticality would require understanding of disorders as multi-dimensional e.g. as bio-psycho-social… but note that any such ‘list’ is likely incomplete and therefore reductionist e.g. the given list already omits the temporal-developmental dimension; but from the practical point of view, since treatment [action] cannot await a completed theory [metaphysics] some list of dimensions must be used and may be far superior to gross reduction
A Note on Reduction as a Theoretical Issue: I believe that the question of reduction is empty. Is all being physical? If ‘physical’ is defined by physical science as it is known today, then no! I would say that even if this phase-epoch were the entire universe though perhaps I should not be so dogmatic in form. If we allow an ideal interpretation of ‘physical’ e.g. a final physical theory – again I say no, for there is no law of all being. But if there were, would the understanding of being be reducible to the understanding of physics: I say no – for a ‘finite’ mind i.e. finite with respect to the understanding of its own universe… a tautology. But if reduction of understanding were possible in principle would it be of practical use: again, no! But, in this last case it would also be stupid to deny the principle and it would be practical to the extent that the principle might shed light or understanding. All that this means is: even if reduction is false we can learn from it; and just because we can learn from it we should not reify it
It has been said that “we all have traits” of this or that – or perhaps most or all disorders. This is usually said of personality disorders but I will leave the statement in its general form. What of this claim? I cannot but disagree with the claim as a universal one although, of course, it is true in some practical sense that we all – or at least most of us – have ‘weaknesses’ and so have some disorder traits even if not enough to cause severe distress or dysfunction or to require or occasion clinical attention. My criticism of the general claim is: What in exacerbation is destructive is often, otherwise, positive or constructive. This lends a shade of meaning to: One’s strength is one’s weakness. It shows one connection between disorder and creativity. Other connections are: what is positively functional in some situations may be dysfunctional in others; disorder and genius are both at the border of ‘possibility;’ genius compensates for disorder; and disorder is opening, makes for sensitivity; of course, combinations of the foregoing; and, these connections have evolutionary-adaptive dimensions
A System of Mental Disorders [Diagnoses] Will Correspond to ‘the’ System of Function… which includes the Dimensions of Being / Mind and the Categories. First there are deep categorial disorders, not often mentioned, because partly subsumed elsewhere: disorders of time, space and cause perception. Thus there are disorders mental function which include the ‘major mental illnesses:’ of thought e.g. paranoia and delusion, disorders of perception e.g. illusion and hallucination, disorders of emotion e.g. affective instability which is biologically based and thought to be pre-disposing to the Borderline Personality Disorder [with explicit recognition in the European / ICD system of diagnosis;] disorders of emotional regulation e.g. mood disorders. The foregoing include schizophrenia which is a brain/neurotransmitter [?] disorder that manifests as a psychotic system and disintegrative system [but not limited to this in its manifestation or secondary consequences.] [Further the categorial – I am using the term with more than one shade of meaning – lack of distinction between thought and perception shows up as the lack always clear and essential distinction between delusion and hallucination i.e. the lack of distinction is not merely a confusion that hallucination is real.] Then come disorders of personality and identity. And there are disorders of function with a mental component such as sleep disorders…
On Society, Language and Psychosis… and other social-linguistic bases of ‘aberration’
Make sure that all problems are mentioned in one place [in one of the sections of mind] even if treated elsewhere. These problems include the fundamental ones: the classic mind-matter problem, the problem of mental causation; the basic problems of other minds [Theory of Mind, related Wittgensteinian issues, including privacy and solipsism] and mapping of the mental functions; and secondary problems such binding and object constancy. Make sure to identify all problems. Note that Theory of Mind is discussed in the third major section
General comments | 10.1.03: Solipsism
Here, the point is visited again… As usual we take up the topic for what we can learn – by its consideration and because many common assumptions about mind and experience are equivalent to it and therefore mistaken
The issue of solipsism. This is essentially an issue of whether anything can be inferred from a datum… but
Can data be atomized?
Is there such a thing as a pure, given datum?
Mind: Other Minds… Again | 1.31.04
As usual, I take up this topic not merely for its own sake but because there is much to be learnt from its consideration
At the bottom of p.19 of The View from Nowhere, 1986, regarding “the problem of placing ourselves in a world of which we are not the center…,” Thomas Nagel asks “not, ‘How can I conceive of minds other than my own?’ but,
‘How can we conceive of minds subjectively incommensurable with our own?’ In both cases we must conceive of ourselves as instances of something more general in order to place ourselves in a centerless world.
The interesting problem of other minds is not the epistemological problem, how I can know that other people are not zombies. It is the conceptual problem, how I can understand the attribution of mental states to others. And this in turn is really the problem, how I can conceive of my own mind as merely one of many examples of mental phenomena contained in the world.”
Briefly, the response is not of the kind attempted in behaviorism. Rather, while it is part of the human condition to have no real intuitive problem with other minds, in philosophy, the understanding of other minds begins with generalization or abstraction from the individual point of view
Consider the variety of perceptual experiences: sight which involves shape, size, color, brightness, motion… then hearing and the other modes of perception of the environment and, in addition, the inner senses that include emotion, pain, balance and motion-dynamics. We can conceive of colors other than the ones we experience e.g. a color corresponding to infrared and so on which would not be one of the colors of the “visible” spectrum. Or we could conceive of the experience of vision for species with other kinds of eyes. Eyes are direction eyes which have a number of light sensitive cells but no focusing lens and focusing eyes. Focusing eyes are simple which have a single eyeball that includes a lens and retina; and compound eyes that consist of a number of closely packed elements each of which is essentially a simple eye. Compound eyes are found only in arthropods and are most highly developed in insects and crustaceans. Apparently, in insects, an impression of the shape of objects in the environment is formed by scanning and partial integration in the brain; insects have good color vision that commonly extends into ultraviolet – the ultraviolet reflection patterns of flowers is often quite different than the reflection pattern for light in the “visible” spectrum – and occasionally into the deep red. Clearly, while it is seems impossible for a human individual to have i.e. to duplicate the feeling experience of an insect seeing the world [this is not totally obvious e.g. consider a machine with a hundred optical cells that send impulses that are connected to a human optic nerve…,] it is possible to imagine that insects have vision and that that vision is unlike the corresponding experience in humans; while observation is based in deduction from physiology and behavior, remember, also, that the experience of e.g. “red” might be quite unlike for the two species and that humans may have no feeling at all that corresponds to what insects experience in “red” light; additionally, at least in the case of humans, the experience of visual perception is significantly affected by thought, mood and anticipation. What is true for vision must be true in one way or another for the other senses
Additionally, other species may have sense that humans do not have e.g. an ability to sense a magnetic field
Then there is the entire world of inner experience especially what might be called constructive experience: memory, visual and other imagery, thought in icons, symbols and language. This world of experience must be vastly different for different species and while it is obvious that there could be other species for which this “world” could be vastly different but also as rich or even vastly richer it is also true that, in some ways, actual other species may have rich inner worlds in the sense of constructive experience
… and there may be dimensions of which we do not conceive but it seems unlikely [though perhaps not impossible] that these dimensions would not fall under the concept of experience [which, here, includes attitude, action and will]
In addition to the above ways and dimensions in which experience can be different, it is possible to [begin to] structure experience:
Bound – in which the experience is tied to the state of the object – versus free experience. Thus, normally, and at least approximately, the visual experience or perception is a function of the state of the environment. This does not mean that it cannot be also expressed as a function of the state and form of the individual e.g. the visual image of a mountain can by no means be said to inhere in the mountain “itself” but its shape, colors and so on are made possible by the individual having the faculty of vision and the “contours” of experience are part of intuition – where ‘intuition’ is used in its Kantian sense. In contrast, free experience is not immediately bound to the state of the environment and can occur in the presence or relative absence of environmental stimuli. The capacity for free experience, upon which thought, free will, creative anticipation, and art depend probably depends, in the first place, in the development of memory. The following questions are worth considering: the possibility of a capacity for bound [subjective] experience without free experience; the possibility of a capacity for [subjective] experience without memory and, more specifically but importantly, the possibility of free experience without memory
Additionally, experience can be structured in terms of some system of categories such as the Kant-Schopenhauerian as extended in Possible Modifications to the Overall Structure of Journey in Being
What is sought, then, in answer to the issues that motivated the present section, is a general concept of experience. Clearly, such a concept is possible but can it be articulated? Within the Kant-Schopenhauerian system it cannot for according to Kant, our ability to realistically conceive the world must be based in what we can possibly experience. However, if a higher being were to give us a universal metaphysics, then we could, perhaps, formulate a general and articulated concept of experience by arguing from the categories of being to the categories of experience; this would be a reverse of the Kantian argument from experience to what is possible in metaphysics. Now, we have seen above that such a metaphysics is possible and it is not necessary to repeat the foundation here except to note that the concept of knowledge under which it is possible is a more realistic conception of knowledge than the one that is extant in the common view, in classical through Kantian to much of modern and recent philosophy; and that that conception of knowledge – and the related concept of belief – has affinities with the knowledge criteria / process as conceived in [1] pragmatism – without subscribing to its anti-realism, and [2] the thought of Karl Popper
The foregoing treatment, especially the considerations of development, together with considerations on identity from Foundation is essentially a treatment of ‘Person’
Also see Logic
Symbol, language and logic may be a separate topic that appears after mind and knowledge or may be integrated with those topics
Origins; requirements for the possibility of a logic i.e. what kinds of being may possess logic
Logos; logic and Logic; is logic arbitrary? Transcendental Logic; nature and origin of logic – what is essential?
Check for existing discussions in Journey in Being, in Kinds of Knowledge, in John Searle, Mind, Language and Society: Philosophy in the Real World, 1998 and in Humberto R. Maturana and Francisco J. Varela, The Tree of Knowledge: The Biological Roots of Human Understanding, 1987… and in discussions thereof
The looping back referred to above may [also] be done at this point. All considerations may loop back to being. The considerations on symbol and language and knowledge; and those on symbol and language may loop back to knowledge
Implications from Wittgenstein
Searle’s work, Mind, Language and Society, 1998
In Greece, in the nascency of – a style of – thought, there were giants; because their language was the language of the universe; but not so in the modern language with its various tributaries that remain implicit and so our references to the real remain in shadows… both weakness and strength
Weakness – poverty of concrete meaning and spirit; lack of nascence
Strength – abstraction; economic strength due to poverty of spirit
Modern thought, including deconstructionist thought and feminism, recognizes the connection among language, freedom and empowerment
The concern here is the ability to describe reality in language. What does or can it mean to say that reality can be described in language? Does it mean that an encyclopedia can be written –by an actual human being in an actual lifetime, supplemented by actual aids such as libraries, aids and computers– that would faithfully represent the entire one-universe and that would algorithmically enable the performance –by any other actual human being and aids– of any possible task? Or does it mean that reality can be described by and or negotiated with the aid of language on a situation by situation basis? Or could it mean that while such ends are not possible or feasible in practice they may be possible ‘in principle’ [which means in accordance with some world view or metaphysics] and that some kind of approach, perhaps asymptotic, to the ideal or ‘in principle’ is possible
Or does it mean that given knowledge of reality by whatever instrument including language, that language can be used to communicate such knowledge to others?
Would Wittgensteinian or Russellian atomicity of world and language and correspondence between the two be required? Would a completed Whiteheadian dictionary or metaphysics be adequate? Are such possible and what are the relations among these possibilities?
Should the depiction in language be explicit or implicit as in e.g. mathematical physics where equations permit computation of actual cases? Although the possibility of mathematical physics to encompass physical reality in this implicit sense does not mean that language can encompass all of reality in any sense an impossibility of mathematical physics to encompass physical reality in an explicit sense i.e. not just in terms of equations but rather as actual functions would probably a similar impossibility for language and all reality. What are the possibilities for language as some implicit kind? E.g. a grammar or an algorithm or just as the instrument that it is… and before rejecting this possibility outright note that various systems of mathematics which may be seen as structures imposed on a symbolic or linguistic base may also be seen as systems in which a base structure implies [or in the hands of mathematicians, ‘generates’] a structure – and, in fact, structures that are often found to be imposing and beautiful by humans
Also note that from any non-atomicity of the world an inadequacy of language does not follow; this is demonstrated by the ability of descriptions and prescriptions of infinities and complex structures such as fractal structures in symbolic terms
Finally, following aspect of the nature of language –that mirrors the questioning of the nature of knowledge as a referential system– should be noted. Is language essentially referential or is it essentially contextual –i.e. arising in a context of action without any essential referential nature– with reference as derivative and perhaps in principle a-realistic? And, therefore, un-realistic? Now, if knowledge is not of this kind and language is, then the question regarding the ability of language to describe reality is significant; however if both knowledge and language are ‘contextual’ in the sense used here then, the realistic ideal of both knowledge and language is based on a metaphysical misconception and what are seen as the inadequacies of animal knowledge and human language are in categorial and conceptual error and, from another point of view, may be seen as an aspect of animal and human freedom
This is a point to place the treatment of knowledge in its animal, human and general forms… and is, thus, also a place to enquire as to a general nature of knowledge [Knowledge] that abstracts from [transcends] and generalizes its particular forms. Though related, knowledge and mind are distinct topics. Thus, knowledge may be the fourth topic of Division 1; alternatively, mind and knowledge will be two interrelated sub-sections within the third topic on mind. The foundation in being also yields insight [I am not being specific here] into symbol and language whose treatment will be thus modified and placed after that of knowledge. For reasons stated below, if the treatment of symbol and language is separate from that of knowledge, it may be useful to include preliminary considerations on symbol and language in the discussion of knowledge as the need arises
What is its importance in general; and its role in civilization and the modern world?
E.g. in everyday activities
E.g. in science, religion and the disciplines
E.g. myth / story
E.g. the power of belief / faith held as knowledge [an original role… and a continuing role?]
E.g. the power of dreams
E.g. … why are human beings often talking about, preoccupied with, how to live and be, how to do things? Examples: the mundane – exercise, respect your father, eat right, how to have a successful relationship; the technical: science and technology; art: inducing inspiration; the sacred: the Bible, the Koran, spirituality… So Why? It is because we are on the cusp of ignorance and knowing! I.e. the importance of knowledge especially in the finite and emerging human phase
Knowledge and charisma: what relation?
Role in Journey in Being
‘Why knowledge?’ leads to the twin questions, ‘What is knowledge?’ and ‘How is knowledge justified?’ The latter contains an implicit question of the role of knowledge and whether knowledge is always bound together with truth and justification. These issues are taken up next
In the first place [a claim to] knowledge is a relationship between a concept [mental ‘content’ that has meaning or sense] and a reference in the world: a knowledge claim is capable of being of being true [valid or correct] or false
Thus knowledge is unlike ordinary objects that are not relationships
But the knowledge relationship is of a special kind: it is about the world and this arises on account of the sense or meaning; thus the idea of intensionality is already incorporated in the idea or concept of knowledge
Already we should expect ‘trouble’ with the idea of truth or validity – for to know that a belief is true we must go outside the belief relationship between a mental content and the world; but it is not always possible to ‘go outside’ as in experimental or logical confirmation. This is the source of the question of justification and also the reason to question of whether justification is always ‘justified.’ Owing to the loop knowledge ® action ® knowledge' ® action' … justification is not always possible or absolute in a sense of presiding over the realm. I.e. of knowledge. Also, in practice untrue things can be justified and truth is the latest or best justified – again since it is impossible to get outside the knowledge relationship ever in any absolute way
Justification does not preside over the court of knowledge but reigns only in a province whose character must be one of sufficient isolation from the great stream of being; even in its domain it shares power with discovery that is in some ways the greater of the two; and its consideration must come later. In the end, it is not clever to always demand justification or even truth; the future potential of being-in-a-temporal-phase requires action in the absence of the security of justification or truth
I have written, in Journey in Being and elsewhere, on connections between knowledge and value: what is knowledge and what is to count as knowledge are not independent of value or ethics. Another way of saying this is that, at the level of human being, what counts as knowledge – even knowledge that – depends on the objective at hand: and it is only for some objectives that e.g. certainty is required or that the luxury of certainty is allowed. It could be argued that something else – according to whatever criteria – is not knowledge. But where does this come from, who is the arbiter? The individual who insists on certainty as a criterion whether 50% or 100% - it is not clear that there is such a thing as 100% certainty – has certain kinds of objectives in mind. And in some ways the actual criteria, in use, are determined by the community at large and its survival i.e. the criteria come before discussion. In the end it may be remembered that certainty is not the path to achieving highest being
The relation between these thoughts and Wittgenstein’s later thoughts on the [indefiniteness] of linguistic meaning [reference is a special case] is evident
Note that the indefiniteness of linguistic meaning is one source of slack in concepts
In all examples of the Gettier type a belief in a true proposition, p, is justified by someone but the individual does not [really] know that p. Thus the Gettier problem is of finding an alternative or enhancement to the standard justified-true-belief analysis of knowledge
In the present brief analysis it is not necessary to assert that the individual does know p in some sense and that asserting that he does not know p involves “tricks with mirrors.” Nor need I concern myself with a variety of objections such as that Gettier type examples rely on the “false principle that false propositions can justify belief in other propositions,” for other examples have been given that do not rely on the “false” principle. Were I to have concern with these issues a careful distinction of the various shades of meaning of know, of implication… would be necessary
In all Gettier and related examples, a criterion [concept] of justification is used that, although it produces belief in a true proposition, could, in other circumstances, produce belief in a false one. Clearly, this is not a mark against the idea dating back to Plato of knowledge as “justified, true belief”
However, the question is raised regarding the adequacy of that criterion of knowledge
The crucial question which is raised or, rather of which we are reminded, is, “Whether there is any criterion of justification that can always, if validly applied, produce [true or certain] knowledge?” There are a number of suggested criteria that eliminate some cases where justified, true belief is not knowledge but is there one that can eliminate all such cases?
Probably not. For, knowledge is in the “mind of the believer” and refers to states of actuality; and there is likely always some way to “fool” the believer
“You can fool all of the people some of the time”
The issue concerns whether justification [a process] can always result in true or certain knowledge [a state]
Academics have an understandable obsession with “certainty.” Certainty is not required for life and its requirement would be a detriment
Perhaps the crux of the issue is to realize that there is never absolute [certain] knowledge of actual states of affairs even in the case of simple propositional knowledge; the analysis would then involve “degrees” of certainty and “degrees” of [confidence in] justification
Perhaps the analysis of belief [as a vector over all possibilities] and knowledge in Journey in Being will be useful in clarifying the issues; however, I expect that progress can be made along the lines suggested even with restriction to classical concepts of belief and knowledge
The issue is of importance beyond simple propositional knowledge. In science, for example, theories are often regarded as justified and “known” when it is also known that all theories except the present ones have been found wanting; justification is, perhaps, a pragmatic concern while certain knowledge an absolute one
Consider the following concepts; add to Journey in Being… and to Words
Belief, concept, content, existence, explanation, idea, imagination, intuition, knowledge, meaning, percept, rationality, reason, reference, sense, thought, understanding
Vernunft, verstehen… use, e.g. Michael Dummett, Frege: Philosophy of Mathematics, 1991
At this point, two tours of knowledge are indicated. The first – the present section – is of modes, kinds and distinctions and the second of knowledge itself: the essential kinds, their possibilities and ranges and justifications. The latter is of intrinsic interest but is also suggestive for the first lest it be thought that a complete grasp of the kinds has been had… The value of the tour is that of the presentational form! We view, describe and evaluate object and concept, knowledge and belief and, in the end, the understanding of all may change and grow
Immersion / acquaintance / description
Symbol versus icon
Knowing how versus knowing that
Mind / body
Explicit versus institutional: culture, ritual…
Action theory
Analogy to Frege’s theory of meaning: sense and reference
Analysis of belief; various considerations:
Knowledge as belief
Superposition theory from Journey in Being
What one believes is not always what one thinks / believes / says one believes
Pre-verbal belief
Justified, true belief; Gettier Problem
Place of knowledge: the knowledge -> action loop
Earlier I gave reasons to reverse the post-Kantian trend of placing epistemology before the content of knowledge; and of the consequent revolt against transcendent metaphysics. I wanted to do that because I found epistemology to be fundamentally unnecessary to the Theory of Being. and because the significance of epistemology depends on the uses to which knowledge is put. In positivism and to some extent in science, metaphysics must come second; but being is essentially metaphysical for the needs of being, of becoming and action will not wait and are fundamentally and infinitely [because we remain finite] retarded by waiting for verification or any other kind of justification
However in this world considerations of the nature of knowledge and epistemology may be significant in making first steps. These steps, baby-steps from the point of view of the ultimate, are giant-steps for humankind… in some ways
Recall Hume’s positivism and Kant’s response: even after Kant explains the structure of intuition and the synthetic sciences [that he included in the synthetic a priori] Hume’s fundamental criticism remains – Kant’s structure has worked so far or in so and so region but how can we project it given the positivistic criticism?
Also regardless of the criticisms and the philosophy, everyday life and science go on
So what is the contribution of philosophy?
Hume’s fundamental criticism is pragmatically irrelevant. The sun rose this morning; there is no guarantee that it will rise tomorrow. But to live as though it will not is absurd. Hume reminds us of our finitude – we do not need him for that but his criticism leads to the positive philosophy of Kant
Kant’s positive philosophy – the structure of intuition and synthetic knowledge, and of judgment as a starting point for further understanding
Kant’s negative philosophy – the limitation of metaphysics… metaphysics is essential and we are metaphysical at the core; but criticism may and has lead to further positive philosophy: the theory of being… in this sense even the negative philosophy is positive
The Theory of Being is a start to the journey; actual [culture, body, nature] and civilized [art, science…] knowledge begin to show the way e.g. the inspiration of art; and e.g. quantum mechanics as bridging the vast chasm between the theory of being from the void and [this life, this culture, this world in] this phase-epoch of the universe
[I occasionally refer to God in the following discussion. This is altogether unnecessary to the rational development of the arguments. One reason for the reference is bound to the historical significance of the God in the development of the arguments – reference to God is a way to connect to and place the arguments in mutual relation. A second reason is to connect with a discussion in Journey in Being of the possibilities of God as a being intermediate between human / animal being and the totality of all being and existence. As far as the argument here is concerned, the word “God” can be easily eliminated without loss]
The Kantian Synthesis as one summit from which to view philosophical understanding: Philosophy continues in a certain trajectory until the synthesis of Kant and Schopenhauer. First, philosophy seeks to transcend metaphor in the understanding of the world; the first attempts remain metaphorical in language e.g. Thales’ idea that the original substance is water; however the conception is essentially though not explicitly symbolic; I note but do not give much weight to the idea that all knowledge is metaphor –if all is metaphor then, on account of the metaphier-metaphrand relation, nothing is metaphor– although it is clearly valid that in some processes one metaphor is replaced by another, perhaps more general or even universal, metaphor; note, also, that while Thales’ idea is not necessarily new, it does mark the origin of a continuous and recorded tradition. Immediately, philosophers ask about the origin and validity of such knowledge and there are two immediate responses. The empiricist tradition seeks origin of knowledge in experience while the idealist tradition holds that ideas of the world are not completely dependent on or completely formed out of experience; the two approaches are not logically exclusive but the traditions have tended to be exclusive and this has resulted in some extreme though interesting positions not pertinent in this discussion – see e.g. History of Western Philosophy. In the rationalistic idealism of Descartes and Spinoza, while certain knowledge is possible its source is not experience but rationalism that is exemplified by mathematics i.e. by clear and distinct thinking. Empiricism reaches a peak with John Locke who held that ideas are not at all innate but derived from experience i.e. from sensation and reflection; in Locke’s terminology, the power that objects have to produce definite ideas in us are qualities – primary qualities such as solidity and extension belong to the object and secondary qualities such as colors and tastes are nothing in the objects themselves but the powers to produce various sensations by the primary qualities: thus while the secondary qualities do not exist without a subject they are no less objective than the primary qualities
Direct and indirect or inferred knowledge: Before proceeding to the synthesis of Kant and Schopenhauer it is essential to note a distinction between knowledge of things and knowledge about things that does not result directly from perception but indirectly e.g. by inference from perception
In the Kantian Synthesis, knowledge is an inseparable function of knower and known: In the watershed synthesis of Kant and Schopenhauer, the concept or idea and the object are bound together. It is the intuition that gives to the world the forms that it has in experience; these are a joint function of the object and the subject. The essential forms of intuition are those of space, time and causation. Further, since the mind brings its forms to nature, it follows that it can know a priori the laws of nature. However, the forms are not those of nature in the raw i.e. of the thing-in-itself or noumenon; the forms are what Kant calls phenomena. The noumenon cannot be known directly but its existence and nature can be inferred
The origin of the intuition; its relation to symbolic understanding: In modern language, the intuition and its forms are a result of adaptation [e.g. of the brain and nervous system; and note that it is not necessary to use the language of evolution for in order to negotiate the world or even for the parts of the organism to function together there must be a mutual accommodation that we call adaptation.] However, the organism as organism is not adapted to the universe at large but to a specific environment or set of environments and therefore the forms of intuition are not universal even as phenomena. The foregoing statement requires modification; the adaptation of organisms may include not only fixed adaptation but adaptability. In human being, the ability to envision how the world “might be,” in pictures and in symbols [language] and to act on the vision [“experiment”] is a key to such adaptability; through this ability, human individuals and cultures can adapt to different environments and, as in science and philosophy, to more inclusive environments. It may be emphasized that in such adaptation it is not the organism but the culture or the system of ideas that changes; some mutual adaptation of organism and culture is necessary at least sufficiently to avoid excessive antagonism of function [it is possible for adaptation of the organism and of culture to interact; here, while not necessary, the language of evolution is suggestive.] Although, explicit reference is to the iconic and symbolic depiction of “reality” there is nothing in the foregoing that disallows art and its forms whether in visual symbols, or in language [e.g. poetry,] or in music. Thus, the limitations of the intuition for organism as organism which, for a given kind of organism are a priori limitations do not imply a corresponding limitation to the symbolic forms of knowledge and art. Such symbolic forms are actual ways in which the limitations of the intuition to a specific set of environments may be overcome. Even when the “literal” content of myth or religion is empty, the artistic contents: metaphor, poetry, architecture, sculpture-painting, and music have the potential to relate the whole individual to the entire universe
[Alternative “overcoming” not limited to the present actuality but not immediately pertinent to the present discussion is considered in Journey in Being. John the Scot argued that it is impossible for any sentient being to know, in the sense of understand, its own nature; and, in consequence, even God does not know his own nature. Consider, however, Spinoza’s concept of God i.e. God as the totality of what there is which, said, Schopenhauer was not to explain God but to enrich language with a superfluous synonym for the word “world.” However, while my being is enhanced by even some understanding of myself it is not clear how this is a restriction on God / world; to complete the argument it will be necessary to inquire what is the meaning of a concept when extended in this way and the concepts of both God and of knowledge will require consideration]
The nature of the noumenon; question the absolute distinction of knower and known: It is now pertinent to talk of the thing-in-itself i.e. the noumenon. Consider a common “object” such as a tree; the quotes signify that the reference may be at most metaphorical since, as far as the intuition is concerned, the object is a joint function of the organism’s powers of perception and the world. However, since the form of the tree is brought to the world in intuition as much as it is of the world it is a contradiction to talk of the tree-in-itself and simultaneously identify that with the tree which is the phenomenon. Kant argued for the specific thing-in-itself which, thus, seems to be a contradiction and for this reason Schopenhauer omitted from his philosophy a conception of the specific thing-in-itself. Both Kant and Schopenhauer gave arguments [some evident from the definition of noumenon] that direct knowledge of the noumenal is impossible. Further, from the fact that space, time and causation are forms of the phenomenal, of intuition, these categories can have no significance within the noumenal; additionally, since space and time are the forms of differentiation, the notion of differentiation as such can have no application within the noumenal; this is a reason given by Schopenhauer for arguing that the noumenal is undifferentiated. It must be noted that such knowledge of the noumenal is inferential and not direct. The correct inferences are however that the organism cannot know things-in-themselves and that the organism cannot directly know causation or differentiation within the noumenal and that the organism cannot know directly that the noumenal can be coordinated in terms of ‘space’ and ‘time’ or ‘space-time.’ In order to talk accurately about things-in-themselves we must have some conceptual system and, then, it is not guaranteed that such knowledge is final; however, note that the fact that thus far all except the latest theoretical systems in science have been replaced is often taken to imply that this process is unending: the correct inference is that it may be unending and, therefore, to the best of our knowledge there may be an end to the sequence. What then do we know of the noumenon? Within the present framework, nothing accurately or finally. We may think, as did Schopenhauer, of the noumenal and phenomenal as alternative modes of knowing the world [double aspect] but we will give reasons, below, to go beyond a need for such a duality. The Schopenhauerian concept of the noumenon may correspond to my concept of the void: without space-time as-we-know-it, without pervasive space-time at all, without cause or law; but capable of giving rise to form, to pattern, to cause [total and partial] and law and, perhaps as we shall see, as capable of giving rise [but not causally in any strict sense] to the forms of knowledge and intuition. These arguments also show that an absolute distinction of known from knower is a contradiction
The world as the totality of what there is; implication for the nature of the world; relation to the distinction between the noumenal and the phenomenal: Spinoza had argued that the totality of what there is cannot be explained without reference to anything else; it must be self-subsistent, the only uncaused cause [for Spinoza, this was God but it is equivalently the world; therefore, according to Spinoza, whereas human being has two attributes – consciousness / time and extension / space, God may have an infinite / indefinite number of attributes; and in this way of understanding all “things” are a part or attribute of God / world and require God’s / the world’s existence for their existence.] Schopenhauer agreed with Spinoza’s position, thought it to be fundamentally important but that that Kant’s distinction of the phenomenal from the noumenal was immeasurably more important; however, the idea that God / world may have an infinite number of attributes is on the way to and perhaps even beyond the distinction
World and void: I have written [I reasoned this independently] that the world as the totality of what there is, the one-universe, must be uncaused for if it had a cause that would be outside the one-universe and that would be a contradiction. Thus, God [according to whatever concept] must be part or the whole of the universe; whether God exists or not is dependent of what concept is employed: it is possible to be sufficiently non-specific that the existence of God is necessary e.g. God is all powerful not in the sense of being able to effect any outcome but in the sense of possessing all the power that there is for the one-universe satisfies this concept; it is an unjustified leap to conclude from such arguments that other, more specific, concepts of God “exist.” Note that it is redundant to talk of the “one-universe” for “universe” ought to be sufficient except that the meaning of “universe” has become varied through use. However, within the one-universe there may be the phase of the void from which its manifest phases come. I have argued that whatever is possible is necessary; therefore the void will “manifest.” Alternatively, the universe-as-manifest [not in the sense of known but, rather in the sense of as actual] may be seen as equivalent to the void; this is the language to use if one is to think in terms of adaptation rather than evolution
What are the forms of intuition: Kant conceived the forms of intuition as those of space, time, cause and the categories; Schopenhauer abandoned the categories are artifacts and retained only space, time and cause. However, as the philosophy of the void has shown and as is also manifest from Kant, from Schopenhauer and from modern physics, causation –strict or other– is far too specific to be a universal category of nature, of the world; further despite the intuition of causation it cannot be a category of the intuition to the exclusion of a-causality; there must be something to balance causality in intuition and something more general than causation in the understanding. That more general thing we call chaos or the emptiness of the void – or indeterminism; causation is but one of its limiting varieties and humor balances causation in intuition in orienting the individual to the unpredicted and unexpected but significant events of the world; the concept of humor can be generalized from its position as an aspect of intuition into the realm of the conceptual where it is a phenomenal counterpart of chaos. Perhaps space-time-being can also be seen as a variety of chaos
Eliminating the distinction between the phenomenal and the noumenal: The concept of the phenomenon as distinct from reality is based on the obvious intuition of knowledge being held in a knower and regarding the known. I argued as follows in Journey in Being. The paradox of consciousness is that of it arising from dumb and inert matter; the resolution is not that matter does not exist or that matter is insufficient to consciousness and that some new category of being is necessary to explain mind. It is first required to accept that our understanding of matter is a dual of a conceptual framework combined with experience including science; and that both framework and experience are limited at present but that the traditional conceptual limits are significantly conventional even though the experiential-scientific limits are not; it is logically necessary that any limiting concept of matter must have some element of the conventional. The elements of being include interaction; and what is interaction at any elementary level corresponds to consciousness at our level; dumb-inert matter is not at all inert. But, then to what is called mental at our level corresponds the interaction of the elements at the elementary level; this is not to say that mind-as-we-think-of-it occurs at the elementary level – that results in the criticism that an absurd pan-psychism has been posited; rather, the concept of the mental has been validly expanded; and, the world is not mind and especially not mind-as-we-think-of-it; rather, experience and actuality are duals. The argument is now inverted. The suggestion comes from physics where, over and over, it is found that relationship becomes concept and concept is discovered to be being e.g. the electromagnetic interaction among particles is a photon. While the suggestion is literal [or has a literal counterpart] at the elementary level it is not taken literally at the level of organism. Here we observe that knowledge is a relationship between knower and known; it is asymmetric between knower and known. But, knower and known are bound in adaptive relationship; here, again, evolutionary language and thought are possible but not necessary. The asymmetric relationship at the level is an adaptive binding of knower and known at the level of organism into an organic unity that, as far as atomism holds, is an expression of the binding at elementary levels and is otherwise an organic binding. Thus the phenomenal is rather than an alternate mode to the noumenal, at our level, a part of it but, with an expansion of the concept of the phenomenal identical to it; the relationship is one of actual identity rather than of causation or mode of description / experience [dual aspect]
Thus far, the argument has started with the elementary description and proceeds to high level manifestation
The argument can be inverted: the high level phenomena must be an expression of the noumenon; for it to be otherwise would raise a contradiction between the “otherwise-ness” and the concept of the noumenon which is known to exist
The argument can be generalized: whatever we take the high level manifestation to be i.e. mind and matter or, in more neutral and non-Cartesian terms, idea and will or experience and will – and certainly there is merit to Schopenhauer’s conception that, perhaps, needs further analysis or refinement – the high level must be a manifestation of the noumenon
Comment on pan-psychism: it has been said that Arthur Schopenhauer asserted that the inner nature of all things is will and that this is a pan-psychistic thesis. Schopenhauer claimed that the inner nature of all things is will and representation – but the question of interest is whether this is pan-psychistic. First, there is no assertion that the elementary nature of things is not material but rather Schopenhauer is asking what the nature of this materiality is. Second, the ‘will’ of Schopenhauer’s philosophy is being confused with our experience of will which is something that Schopenhauer explicitly expected but did not intend; rather the ‘will’ in Schopenhauer’s philosophy may be thought of as ‘cause’ though of course Schopenhauer said and intended more than this. However, this is pan-psychism in the gross sense just as much as materialism is the thought that the fundamental particles of physics are bricks or Eiffel Towers
Two limits to knowledge – specificity of adaptation and subjectivity; limits to these limits: Earlier, I showed how the ecological limits [due to the specific place of the organism] to knowledge may be overcome; here we have seen how the putative Kantian impossibility of knowledge of things is based on a notion of a thing-in-itself as distinct from the subject which distinction, rather than being given, is a [conceptual] picture
Foundation in the void: All this is conceptually equivalent to or, alternatively and actually, arises from the void. Such actuality may be referred to as material but such reference is unnecessary and may be misleading
Knowledge as object; realm of justification, realm of belief and action, realm of knowledge as being
… and, equivalently, as adaptation
The section on knowledge is a place to possibly include Journey in Being 1.6.11 Metaphysics and the Possibility of Knowledge and Logic of the current version
The real question is, “What is the relation between knowledge and action?”
Could similarly ask about the possibility of philosophy, of metaphysics, of science… and the considerations might go to relevant sections
The intuitive idea of an object may involve: concreteness, definiteness, sharp boundaries, fixed constitution, and localization
In the development of the concept, none of these is necessary
In the first place I am not aiming at a “definition.” This is not only because science is a complex activity that can be seen from a number of perspectives but also because the objective is to understand what science is and this occurs incrementally. Further, since the “meaning” of science is wound up with and to a significant degree contained in the activity of science, a complete definition is neither aimed at nor possible. Here is one place where Thomas Kuhn may have made a definite contribution except it is not the case that he is the first to have so understood science or complex objects including institutions in general
In the second place, while science is important, the approach used here can be employed for other institutions. This aim would not be satisfied by giving a definition
Third, science can be seen as a specific and limited kind of activity demarked by the disciplines of science and as rather exclusive in nature… or it can be understood as a very general approach which will be relatively broad and not defined by actual science alone; even in the latter case not every activity will be science but many activities thought not to be science will be seen to have a scientific component. Further, it will be possible to see what science and other creative and institutional endeavors have in common and where they diverge
What characterizes science?
The first approach to characterizing science will be to consider the so-called scientific method. Although science is empirical it is not merely empirical; for science is concerned with patterns and therefore experiments will confirm or disconfirm patterns. Where do the patterns come from? The old and Baconian concept of induction was that the patterns [laws] were inferred from data by inductive reasoning. But this is not how laws are arrived at; nor is it always possible for laws to be directly suggested by data. Simple laws such as a straight line may be so suggested. More generally, a law is hypothesized [which depends in part on imagination] and found to agree or disagree with data. [The popular idea that a single point of disagreement requires a law to be discarded requires modification; useful laws may continue to be used with care and, further, disagreement between new data and established law may cast doubt on the validity of the data… similar comments apply, also, to concepts and theories.] The law, however, is not the peak of scientific expression; science also depends on concepts and theories which are more general and come after the simpler laws. Again, concepts and theories do not follow from data but must be hypothesized; and hypotheses are suggested by data, laws, other concepts and theories and require imagination. The process can be formalized to suppress the imagination and emphasize method in the simple formula where hypothesis includes concepts, laws and theories:
1. Hypothesis
2. Test [empirical and rational]
3. Repeat
Of course, imagination is not actually suppressed but only formally. Imagination can be partially eliminated from the formal process by focusing on proof or justification but this is not a real elimination of imagination i.e. of concept creation which includes modification and adaptation. An illusion of the elimination of imagination is made possible that except during scientific revolutions i.e. in ‘normal science’ in Kuhn’s sense of the phrase and for the majority of the practitioners, concepts are given
Hypothesis formation is induction of which there is no absolute method – this is too well known and I have written on this so often that to make the point in detail here would be unnecessary labor; it is sufficient to observe there is an infinity of functions that satisfy any set of data. It is worth adding that while simplicity, elegance have been suggested as informal or heuristic criteria, what is often telling is the coordination of hitherto unconnected ideas, subsumption of otherwise mere data, inclusion of older theories as limiting cases. Examples abound. Further, as in quantum mechanics, when alternative new theories present as in competition it is further telling if their equivalence is shown. What is the character of such accomplishments? Although not final for there may be domains beyond what is subsumed, a realm of behavior has been discovered and cataloged – in the Kantian sense a cognitive object has been formulated
But even though there is no ultimate method of justification although there are some methodologies that are useful
The method of science is also an open question even though it is not as fluid as science itself. Methodology is always being added to or otherwise modified. The method is open to elaboration, see Journey in Being, where it includes [deriving from the work of Roland Omnes] experimentation, conception, development and verification
Here, method is not thought of as ‘algorithmic.’ Instead, method refers, in the first place, not to elimination of imagination or creativity or intuition but, along with free reign which is important, subjecting imagination to coherence, applicability and, if we are lucky, to adequacy. Secondly, method – but not METHOD – refers to a variety of practices that vary somewhat over time and according to discipline and explicit specification of such institutional practices – Kuhn is clearheaded on this – is not always possible and thus there is always the potential for confusion of practice and mere fashion.
Now, the details of scientific methodology and what constitute proper subjects for investigation cannot be and is not formulated in words and concepts alone. As Kuhn suggested, the actual practices arose in the development of science and are institutionalized and – at least partially – unspoken even though accessible to attempts at articulation. While such paradigmatic rules are necessary and useful, they may also become outdated and excessively rigid and authoritarian; to some extent this is in the nature of such rules since they are the expression of practice and learned in apprenticeship
What is the distinction between science and the humanities? The humanities are those branches of knowledge that concern themselves with human beings and their culture or with analytic and critical methods of inquiry derived from an appreciation of human values and of the unique ability of the human spirit to express itself. As a set of disciplines, the humanities include the study of all languages and literatures, the arts, history, and philosophy. Thus, while emotion may be appealed to in the in the humanities, emotion will not be used in the method of science. Of course, emotion may motivate scientific study and may be used in the thinking about the comparative utility of scientific and humanistic disciplines… and, emotion is a proper topic of scientific inquiry
Of the humanistic disciplines, science is closest to philosophy. Early in their histories, the studies that have become the scientific disciplines were part of philosophy. Natural philosophy referred to the study of nature; psychology separated from philosophy in the later 19th century. Later, the distinctions hardened as the disciplines and institutions developed their special interests, as it became apparent that philosophy was not necessary for the advance of science and, also, as parochialism set in. Careful study of the history of knowledge shows that during revolutionary periods in science, philosophical – especially conceptual – thought becomes important and thus the distinction is not complete. Also, philosophy remains dependent upon science in enquiries such as general cosmology. Thus there are distinct subject matters and common interests which situation is no different than before the separation; and, where the interaction is important, hybrid disciplines develop e.g. philosophy of science, philosophical psychology and so on. Today, while the core of science emphasizes the hypothetical-critical study of the world in its elementary terms [matter, life, the elements of mind,] philosophy emphasizes the hypothetical-critical study of the most general aspects of the world and, especially, ideas and the content of thought. Naturally, the critical elements are different: science emphasizes empirical test and mathematics, philosophy emphasizes analysis. The social sciences and psychology lie in-between
What are the status of science and the study of art relative to each other? In both cases, hypotheses are essential and critical elements are present but different in character. The study of art necessarily involves the study of wholes without essential atomism; cultural is important in appreciation even though there may be universals in art; and emotion-feeling enter into art criticism
What about science and art? Clearly, art and science are quite far apart but still have similar elements. First some distinctions: while science and the study of art have subject matters – the natural world [conceived as including society and mind] and art respectively but art need not have a subject matter. Art includes the expression of feeling and, even when there is a subject matter, it may be peripheral or expressed indirectly and not even consciously; on the other hand, science is not about the expression of feeling and emphasizes reason, empirical work and mathematics. However, the imagination in both art and science may be symbolic and iconic and occur at sub-conscious levels; and, both scientific theories and works of art may have “incubation” and trial versions that are corrected or improved
It is obviously repressive to expect art and science to fit the same mold; and the requirement that the approach to life be scientific would be limiting and much friction is generated by misunderstanding and by repressive / grandiose approaches that are exaggerated by the dominance of science and analyticity in modern culture. There is no reason to expect or want everything to be artistic or everything to be scientific; or to seek the elimination of either. If my approach to life had to be one but not the other I would choose the artistic; but it does not have to be one or the other and, if I had to characterize my approach with a common label I would use ‘existential’ but stripped of any unnecessary philosophical or cultish overtones. But I would not label my approach for I do not want to essentialize or limit it; I would say, simply, that, for me, the important things are friends and love, the [my] journey into all being and their details, ideas and nature
Plato’s style of argument is, often, to examine all sides of the concern at hand and, at least for some, leave the reader wondering what the conclusion may be and what Plato’s position may be. Additionally, Plato considers – in contrast to Post-Machiavellian pseudo-realism – what the highest ideal may be without [obviously given the first point] commitment to the necessity or possibility or impossibility of its achievement
Journey in Being is committed to the highest ideal in just the Platonic sense as stated. Of course it is a high ideal, one formulated in Journey in Being, that all being is accessible to every being; this is an ideal but more than just an ideal for various proofs are given of this position, The Principle of Being, including realistic and [upcoming] formal proofs; the position is necessary; in this way Journey in Being subscribes to and deviates from Platonic Idealism in just the sense and not necessarily any other; but, in its deviation, it also subscribes. It need be noted that although I refer to a kind of idealism of Plato, it is not given that this is a Platonic position; nor need it be my absolute position
“The only thing that is certain is that nothing is certain,” taken literally, is a contradiction
Here, I want to consider the first point regarding Plato’s style referred to in the first paragraph of this entry. The ‘value’ of concern is that of truth. Note though that occasionally, Plato’s argument, in its examination of all ‘sides’ considers merely formal [meaning linguistic] argument and, in doing so, becomes unmoored from reality. This is not necessarily a criticism for a symbolic animal will always tend to fall in to that condition [it is the unfortunate fate of some philosophers and some schools of philosophy to remain in the condition;] which may be but is not necessarily error and which even when error may lead to truth; but, having become unmoored – mooring may also be sought in the Platonic-Socratic ‘counterpoint.’ Truth and high ideal is something which I seek, of which I often fall short, and which, though sought in abundance in the Journey, is clearly lacking in some discussions especially the discussion of politics in Division 4 of Journey in Being. That lack may receive much remedy under the inspiration of Plato’s Republic and John Rawls A Theory of Justice
I want to reflect upon the observance of the value of truth. Is this an ultimate value that must be observed at all times? Obviously not as a condition of existence or as a fact of the being of a symbolic animal. But that is not what I mean; I mean what is the value of the value of truth? Already we have seen that error may lead to Truth where servility to truth may lead to sterility. But there is Truth and truth and while we, in our play, deviate from the truth as the narrow path, we continue to play in the Light of Truth the ideal. Is that always necessary as a value, as the highest ideal, as the condition that will lead to or be the highest form of our being? In an important sense, not, for we have seen that residence of our thoughts in truth while our being languishes is a form of laziness of allowing ourselves to feel noble while actually falling short of ideal possibility and, since what is possible is necessary, ideal necessity. This a key point of Journey in Being where in a high ideal is the destination but not destiny as necessity of being – e.g. our e.g. my being. Occasionally, in Journey, I have allowed myself to believe something without full commitment for years – holding the belief as necessity along side with doubt but not in perfect balance but rather in ebb and flow and occasional balance. The discussion, from Journey in Being, of belief as a superposition of all possibilities with different weights comes to mind. Anyway, as a result of allowing myself the luxury and the ‘pain’ of belief in something that I could not rationally show – I finally showed my deepest thought; rather, that thought finally shone through as uncloaked and revealed to a traveler in a strange land. And, having done so or rather seen, I subscribe to the idea that subscription to the same principle but in another sphere – experiments in transformation – may lead to the ultimate in being; that is my next goal. Truly, I do not know where or whether I will arrive; and at the same time it is my condition that I do know… at least in the sense that there is no subjective distinction between knowing and thinking that one knows. There is an analogy, but perhaps more than an analogy, with the creation of being from the void where virtual elements are ‘in equilibrium’ with the void with their transient and eternal coming into and out of being but here and there some transient elements fall into mutual near-stable forms and so have an existence that, still transient, may, for a moment of eternity, be as stable – be as if eternal. Here is the analogy: the subjective condition of knowing-being with the shadow virtual elements and the actual condition of knowing-being with the as stable elements. Looking to the future, After The Journey, I may allow myself, again, the luxury of bathing permanently in truth – that condition in which my thoughts, in analogy with those of Plato’s, are virtual elements – like Shelley’s worlds on worlds rolling ever From creation to decay; Like the bubbles on a river, Sparkling, bursting borne away – without the pain of that becoming which is a commitment to stability in the service of becoming. Perhaps
What then is the value of the serpentine journey of the uncommitted form of argument? In Plato’s hands it was the exploration of a universe of ideas – actual-virtual elements that may constitute the elements of an actual knowledge
As noted above, this sub-topic could appear in one or more of the following topics: Theory of Being, Knowledge, or The Problems of Metaphysics; the point may be repeated in the stated topics; note that if it occurs in more than one of the topics, different aspects may be treated in the different section
Issues include:
Showing the entire range in principle [and in valuation] without completing in an Encyclopedic way
Realms of being
Cultures
Disciplines
Connection with Journey in Being; also explicit in principle
Showing that the stated range is the entire range. Or, answering the question as best I / we can, “To what extent is the given range complete?” Of course, completeness will not be regarded as not obtaining on account of gaps of fact and detail
Question of human knowledge versus knowledge
Modern
Sciences
…
Is art knowledge?
Distinguish ‘The Art of’ versus ‘Art’
What is Art? Art as the induction of states of mind and intention –especially the will to higher being or becoming– through symbolic, artifactual and dramatic i.e. all categorial means
Decorative; beautiful; inspiring
‘Great art’ seems to be a result of the labor of genius; ‘labor’ does not necessarily connote ‘laborious’ but, rather, also, the momentum of genius. Mozart’s “early talent for music was remarkable; at three he was picking out chords on the harpsichord, at four playing short pieces, at five composing; there are anecdotes about his precise memory of pitch, about his scribbling a concerto at the age of five…” – genius as a gift rather than merely the product of labor and development. Also, genius does not appear, necessarily, to understand its own nature. And, while ‘few’ can produce great work many can appreciate… There is appears to be a ‘genetic’ component to the distribution of genius
Another example: Ramanujan
What is the significance of this?
It appears to point away from some ways in which we react to art and use art
Art is self-inspiration of humankind
…as an aspect of ‘Knowing How’
As in the Case of Knowledge, the Remaining Topics Have a Context in Being and May be Improved by Considerations from the Theory of Being and Especially the Theory of the Void and its Place in Understanding Being as Developed in Journey in Being
Note that knowledge is discussed, primarily, in two places: in the first five sections of the main division, Metaphysics or Knowledge and Action and, second, in section 1.6.11 Metaphysics and the Possibility of Knowledge of the same division. Much of the following has received some discussion in Journey in Being. However, I want a clearer, more complete, consolidated articulation
First, the development of any concept is iterative with experience in the relevant domain and with any growth of the domain starting e.g. with the intuition of the concept and the corresponding domain. Further, since knowledge and concepts are concepts the growth of understanding of concepts will modify the way in which knowledge is viewed; this process will also be iterative. For example, we may want to go beyond the initial intuitive concept of knowledge and begin a process of formalization and enhancement of the intuition; further, since concepts may have essential slack, we will want to avoid unnecessary distinctions and concretizations fostered by the fact that [despite education of the understanding] our paradigm of knowledge may be our own possession of it
It is important to distinguish between the concept [which involves intuition or the actual concept and criteria] and object which in this case is the object itself. Of course, knowledge is not a monolithic concept but there are a number of distinctions such as occurrent vs. dispositional knowledge, knowledge of the body i.e. by immersion vs. knowledge by acquaintance vs. knowledge by description, intuitive vs. symbolic form and expression
We may start off with a very particular view of knowledge which may be conditioned especially that we experience knowledge from the inside. Though this is a valid and necessary place to start we may want to expand the scope of this view by way of generalization and abstraction; and to the extent that the view is misleading we may want also to detach from it; even where the view is not misleading, temporary detachment is useful. Generalization involves recognition that we, ourselves, have a number of modes of knowing of which the intuition may be of a limited set; then, the knowledge of other beings, actual and potential, may include kinds and modes with which we are not familiar. Such generalization does not necessarily involve shedding of the view of knowledge from the inside i.e. that our view of knowledge is initially conditioned by our experience of it. Thus we may want to talk in external terms about what it is for an organism to have knowledge; this may involve form / structure and relationship between internal and external form and it may involve behavior. It is key that such abstraction is not meant to replace the intuition but the abstract and the intuitive supplement each other in synergy. The view from the inside is not shed but it is placed in a broader context with which it is continuous; this also shows up what, in intuition, is limited, what is parochial and what is in error
In other words, we want to consider knowledge as an object. Thus we ask “what are the conditions for the possibility of knowledge such as sufficient stability [of the phase-epoch] of the universe for there to be states of affairs; and, then, the existence of organisms guarantees the presence of knowledge – “knowledge is adaptation and so on.” Additional conditions are necessary for higher or specialized modes of knowledge
My initial expectation and plan for the role of knowledge in the Journey in Being was for knowledge to be foundational. However, I found that the ideas that I wanted to be founded especially the Principle of Being do not require the foundation in knowledge of the kind that I wanted. Involved would have been an analysis of belief, the relation between knowledge and action, the nature of knowledge as an action principle under uncertainty where action was imperative, and the loss of opportunity from the requirement and [tacit] value and valuation that knowledge be certain and definite. Since, as mentioned, the foundation became unnecessary, the developments regarding knowledge became unnecessary from that point of view. However, the developments – still requiring careful analysis, completion and consolidation – remain interesting especially for their independent outcome and the implications for the nature and uses of knowledge and belief. At the same time the new developments regarding the principle of identity, the foundation in the void provide some justification for the new ideas in knowledge and belief that I sought. Additionally, while the foundation for the principle of identity was not necessary a foundation for the means and ethics of realization may still be necessary or useful [as supplement to experiment in transformation via showing the possibilities and that they are possibilities] and requires further thought. In any case, rather than having one principle or another [experiment, knowledge, principle of identity] be foundational, they are all found to interact and be mutually supporting in the forward motion of being
Consolidate all unification of principles [those above and in Journey in Being and elsewhere] and apply as occasioned
The Theory of Being in the Analysis of The Problem of the Noumenon
Kantian Synthesis of Knower and Known | 12.8.03
Supplementary Discussion: The Inferred Character of the Noumenon | 11.11.03
Plan. The problem of the noumenon
The problem is whether the noumenon, the thing-in-itself can be known. ‘Knowledge’ as just used is direct knowledge. The noumenon and its properties are, in principle, open to inference
Knowledge of the noumenon, the thing-in-itself, is appealing… to know the actual thing and to not be restricted to mere appearances
Knowledge of the noumenon is not a question of precision. Knowledge that is precise enough in its own domain is considered to be knowledge; this is true even in the primitive world where I see a trail and think ‘it is there’ but as I get closer I find that it is a little bit closer or further than my original estimate of ‘there.’ What is as important as accuracy but, in practice, is usually implicit and not primary in attention is the idea or concept of ‘path’
What is the idea of the noumenon? As defined it is the thing-in-itself. But think of knowledge. What is it that gives a mountain its shape? What is the source of the colors, the shades and the contours? The mountain itself, in another mode of description, is an accumulation of atoms… its ‘true’ shape is infinitely more complex than the shape it acquires in perception. And further what determines where the atoms that constitute the mountain end and the atmosphere begins? These are not intrinsic to the thing-in-itself and are functions of perception and conception
‘Knowledge’ and ‘thing-in-itself’ are exclusive; knowledge of the thing-in-itself is a contradiction… this is the problem of the noumenon
Noumenon1, noumenon2, noumenon3, and noumenon4
Is the problem of the noumenon dependent upon the background metaphysics e.g. the ‘picture’ of knowledge as detached from the object, something flimsy and contingently or circumstantially connected with the object and in no way required by the thing-in-itself?
Knowledge is thought of as knowledge of the object but not required by the object. However, another view is the one of subject and object in interaction and constituting a whole that is in some ways a conceptual improvement of the idea of knowledge as knowledge-of i.e. knowledge as knowledge-of-something
This does not eliminate or resolve the paradox of the noumenon but it does raise doubts and suggests that the problem has origin not in the totality that constitutes the world and that includes object-subject but, rather, in a picture of that world. The following questions arise
In what metaphysics is the noumenon known? And is there a way to select from among different metaphysics?
It has been said that urbane philosophy does not seek to make such selection but rather to understand the relationships among the variety of metaphysics. However, it may be that circumstances dictate the metaphysics; thus it is conceivable that some metaphysics will make vision so much clearer, the path of action so much more distinct, the actuality of realization so much more so as to leave no alternative. The exigency of the real may require us to relinquish our gentlemanly urbanity
Inasmuch as being is presence, perception is noumenon; even a lesser being in a different metaphysics may conceive the noumenon and develop symbolic knowledge of it in a hypothesis-deduction-correction mode
Inasmuch as knowledge is knowledge-of, the phenomenon and the thing are distinct; this is inherent in the idea of knowledge-of
In what ways can we find knowledge to ‘transcend’ the nature of knowledge-of? Two possibilities are
Phenomenalism according to which knowledge is limited to the phenomena; the phenomena are variously described as physical and or mental but the concept of phenomenalism implies that the distinction is not in kind. In the Kantian form of phenomenalism, the reality of things-in-themselves is affirmed but their knowability is denied. In this Kantian form, experience is not simply experience-of but, rather, the intuition structures experience – the source of the intuition is not specified but may be in adaptation; although the noumenon is not known it is easy to see how the system of intuition and understanding may be mistakenly taken as knowledge of the noumenon. In the phenomenalism of Renouvier, there is no reality behind the phenomena and, therefore, no noumenon; I am not sure how this form of phenomenalism understands the perception that there are phenomena but if it does, is it not re-introducing the noumena?
Interactionism in which knowledge is not knowledge-of or knowledge-about but rather knower and the world form an adapted system. In this case, since knowledge is not fundamentally knowledge-of, the idea of knowledge of things-in-themselves is without sense. In interactionism it is not difficult to build up a primitive theory of how beings may have an ‘internal modeling’ but incomplete of the world that may present as an ‘as-if’ variety of ‘knowledge-of.’ However, to take this literally is to depend on the picture of knowledge as knowledge-of as defining the essence of knowledge; and due to the prominence of the feeling that knowledge is knowledge-of it is easy to take the ‘as-if’ case as if it were the case. However, the prominence of the feeling is due to the fact that in reflection, it is the discrete picture that may be natural to assume rather than the more complete but diffuse one
The Theory of Being and its foundation in the void shed light on the nature of the real and may thus be useful in the analysis of the problem of the noumenon. The following approaches arise:
Phenomenalism combined with the interpretation that the phenomena constitute the world
Consider [1] the idea that while sensory perception is detached from the object, knowledge of the body is direct and noumenal, and [2] being partakes of other being; or, even, being partakes of all being. Assumption of the truth of [1] and [2] implies that knowledge of the noumenon is possible [recall that the assertion that knowledge and thing-in-itself are exclusive only on certain metaphysics]
The phenomena are our experiences of the world. Ever since Kant, the structure of the [phenomenal] world is the structure of experience; therefore, there is no knowing [for Kant] of the noumena – it is not that the noumenon is remote in the way that the elementary particles are remote, unknown but waiting to be known but the noumenon is unknowable and not as a matter of difficulty, or remoteness or even of limitation of the apparati of cognition; the noumenon is unknowable in its nature and therefore it is an error to think of the noumenon and knowability in the same breath. Even God does not know the noumenon. Wanting to know the noumenon is not just a waste of time; knowing the noumenon is not just impossible; the noumenon does not come under the category of the knowable
The ‘assumption’ behind Kant’s theory is huge: it is the assumption of an entire metaphysical system that, according to Kant himself, is unknowable e.g. the substance ontology as a res vera devoid of subjective immediacy [Whitehead; and note that regarding the objection that this appears to be implying that existence of an object requires knowledge of it but it actually implies that existence requires that the object be capable of being in-intimate relation]
In other ontologies e.g. one that includes relation as immanent, it is no longer possible to posit a categorically unknowable category
It is required to ask whether the so-called ‘direct knowledge’ is, after all, any more absolutely direct than ‘inferential knowledge’ to which the noumenon is subject. The directness is illusory and distinctions based on it are not fundamental
We are then in the universe without anchor and that may be experienced as limiting in that not all is known or freeing in that the unknown is not inaccessible
The ‘anchor’ in question is that of being able to step outside of knowing to know knowing. Ideas of anchor include: the ultimate dictionary can be written now; the truth of the written word; the authority of the expert, the guru and so on; words are attachable to objects; those words that are attachable to objects are permanently attachable to objects; objects exist as substances…
Although, as we have seen, there is a way to talk fruitfully of the noumenon we return to the Kantian intuition that the noumenon cannot appear in experience
There is a world of smell accessible to bears, wolves and silk moths; of ultraviolet sensitivity of insects; of infrared sensitivity of reptiles; of communication among dolphins that may be inaccessible to humans… but this has nothing to do with the noumenon, according to Kant, the noumenon is outside all experience – even the experience of God
If we ask ‘What is real but outside all actual and possible experience’ the responses, ‘reality itself’ and ‘nothing’ hang in the background
Even in the Kantian scheme recognize that the ‘noumenon’ and the phenomenal are different apprehensions of the same reality; ‘double aspect’ theories are not especially attractive but may be required on certain metaphysics e.g. the metaphysical assumptions of Kantianism
The whole idea of the noumenal as unknowable is dependent on a number of metaphysical assumptions especially the split of knower and known as ultimate and discrete. In appropriately alternate metaphysics, abundantly discussed in this document, we can replace ‘experience’ by ‘normal experience’ and then the whole discussion of overcoming limits from Journey in Being may be incorporated here
The Kantian scheme provides a, perhaps unintended, integration as follows: the problem of epistemology and the problem of the world are not distinct; one does not e.g. first solve the problem of knowledge and then apply that to understanding of the world. This point is significant even if the negative [critical] aspects of the Kantian scheme succumb to the ‘shaking of its metaphysical foundations’
Kant and Schopenhauer argue that since the noumenon is outside the possibility of experience and since differentiation as such can have meaning only in terms of space and time and since space and time exist only in experience… that the noumenon is undifferentiated and similarly uncoordinated by space-time and without causation
This is not valid; all that is valid, even on Kant, is that we do and cannot experience the differentiation of the noumenon and so on
Gather all information
Review the metaphysical possibilities
Criticize – including selection through action; select-evaluate
In Journey in Being, §1.6.6.2 The Fundamental Role of Experience or Feeling, I discussed these three mental axes. Noting that this system is commonly accepted c. 2003 in the analytic literature on philosophy of mind, I say
“The dimensions of the mental have been characterized as experience, attitude and action. However, real attitude and real action are characterized by the ability to be conscious about those activities”
In the second sentence of the quote, I should change ‘by the ability to be conscious about’ to ‘by awareness of’ or ‘by awareness in’
Explanation of the change first requires an explanation of my use of the term ‘awareness.’ There is a use of ‘awareness’ in which the organism is aware but not conscious; I want to consider two interpretations of this use. In the first awareness, is not different from consciousness in kind; rather, awareness could be thought of as peripheral consciousness as in e.g. cases where an individual is acutely conscious of one scene but then becomes aware that another scene had also been in consciousness but that the individual had not been conscious of that consciousness i.e. not acutely conscious of the second scene. Various elaborations of this meaning of ‘awareness’ are given in Journey in Being, and elsewhere… and are possible. In this meaning, awareness is phenomenal and all conscious states are constitutively aware states but some aware states are, not unconscious, but, rather, not focal within the phenomenal field. The second meaning of awareness is one in which awareness is ‘aboutness’ but is constitutively distinct from phenomenality; this meaning includes the a-consciousness of Ned Block. It is my contention that if such states exist they are not mental states; that a-consciousness may be a useful phenomenon [but my elaboration of phenomenal awareness minimizes such usefulness over and above its meaning as something obvious such as intelligence that Block’s and similar thought is, perhaps under the positivist vestiges of behaviorism and perhaps its simplistic appeal to the ego that has difficulty with uncertainty and that deploys knowledge as a covert and subverted –i.e. even on a political interpretation there is no proper political end despite the often and usually necessarily covert insinuation of ends– political instrument, appropriating as experience] but should not be labeled ‘conscious,’ ‘aware,’ or ‘mental.’ It should be clear that my use of awareness corresponds to the first meaning for the second candidate meaning is, on my account, vacuous. What is that account? It is the synthetic account, begun in Philosophy of Mind, given elaborated and clarified in Journey in Being, and given a principled foundation below in Metaphysics. In this context it is important to note that while the account may seem to be a ‘double aspect’ theory that is only on the ‘prior’ world view of the mental and the material as distinct categories. It is this theory that reveals the continuity of focal consciousness, peripheral consciousness, all awareness and the engagement of the body with the world – including its self-engagement that includes feeling and kinesthetic sense
The idea that ‘attitude’ can be something other than awareness in its proper meaning is false… as demonstrated above. Thus attitude is an element of what may be called extended, intensional, phenomenal awareness. However, as discussed immediately above, the ideas of ‘extended’ and ‘phenomenality’ are included in that of ‘awareness;’ and, further, emphasizing the process aspect, we may think of attitude or attitudinizing as intensing awareness or in the state form intensional awareness… in which ‘intensing’ is the verb form of ‘intensional’
Similarly, action or acting is extended, actuated, phenomenal awareness which results in two forms, as above: actuated awareness, or actuating awareness
Thus attitude and action become intensional and actuating awareness
It is possible to have experience without either afference or efference i.e. without immediate reference to the world and this might be labeled ‘pure experience’ which may be thought of as on the cusp between intension and action or as ‘idle’ experience. However, the idea of experience being constituted of an intension -> action continuum is misleading for the pure phase is a ‘world’ rather than a point. Thus ‘pure’ and ‘idle’ do not do justice to the idea to which they point; that idea may be labeled ‘ideal experience’ in reference to its being the world of ideation and which includes all reverie. These considerations result in:
The system follows from the foregoing. It is similar, obviously, to the attitude, experience, action axes but the meanings are categorically different in concept and significantly different in the distribution of [mental] phenomena among the dimensions
The discussion is a brief but important supplement to what is written on induction in Journey in Being, History of Western Philosophy, and Philosophy of Mind and Consciousness
Induction assumes continuity
An alternative to ‘continuity’ is ‘uniformity.’ What is the meaning of these words as used here? A simple meaning is future patterns will be like past ones; a similar specification could be made with regard to space. Uniformity may also be with regard to scale e.g. an assertion that ‘behavior on small, everyday and large scales of extent or duration will be similar.’ However, this is not true: the large scale structure of the universe, the patterns of behavior at the scale of the planets and solar system, and atomic scale phenomena show even profound differences. To get to levels other than the immediate it has been necessary, in science, to form concepts and to hypothesize laws and theories whose predictions are subject to comparison with the phenomena. This is the method of hypothesis, prediction and comparison and correction sometimes called the hypothetico-deductive method. And, as pointed out earlier, the process is not linear in that many attempts are discarded and not incremental in that some theories result in drastic revision of fundamental concepts, subsumption of vast domains of phenomena previously not explained or predicted. Further, the emergence of such a theory often results in such simplification of hypotheses and elegance of concepts that the theory is experienced as ‘beautiful.’ The assumption of uniformity in time and space is a rough example of the hypothetico-deductive method that usually requires refinement; this is confirmed in physics, biology and geology
Regarding the assumption of uniformity, the following is important. If the domain of phenomena is such that we cannot change the underlying structure or patterns then we can do no better than induction. As an example we normally think that we have no control over the nature of the physical world and its phenomenal patterns; if we were beings that could control or affect the formation of the present phase-epoch of the universe and – naturally – its laws, we might then think differently. The social realm is example of a domain where our behavior has an effect on the patterns; at the same time, the social realm is one where ‘controlled, reproducible experiment’ is often not possible even when some control exists. What are the implications for the application and modification of the hypothetico-deductive method in the study of social phenomena?
Alternative terms are presentationalism and representationalism
Representationism is the view that individuals do not know objects directly but only ideas – or sensations – that are representations of them. According to presentationism, in perception and perhaps also in memory and other cognition, the individual is directly aware of objects
Let us begin the discussion by taking the alternatives at face value. That the thing-in-itself is distinct from knowledge of it, that this view allows for error which can then be estimated are motivating forces behind representationism. However, the thought that there is an object that is represented as an idea and that what the subject knows is the idea appears to be an unnecessary complexity; the alternative, presentationism, in which the subject knows the object appears to be the simpler hypothesis and, on the face of things and given that there is no claim or implication that the knowledge is precise or infallible the obvious one
The underlying view of reality –metaphysics– affects, not just which of these is valid, but also: their meaning, whether they exhaust the possibilities of what it is that is the object of perception, whether they are exclusive i.e. whether either presentationism or representationism may hold but not both, whether they are necessary i.e. whether at least one must hold, what is the significance of the choice; and beyond this level that accepts presentationism and representationism as a valid system of alternatives, whether the system is valid and what underlying view of reality determines that validity and what alternatives there may be
In some versions of idealism, it is experience or ideas that constitute reality and, in this case while it may be possible to go on to talk of the mind, therefore, directly perceiving or knowing objects, the question of knowledge does not truly arise for there is no knowledge of but rather there is one system of reality that is the ideal world… even what we think of as knowledge of knowledge is an idea. The foregoing story is rather like the Kantian description of the phenomenal world for the structure of that world is a function of the constructive intuition; however, this intuition is, in turn, a function of the world that includes subject and object and there is no claim that the objects of intuition are the ultimate objects of reality
In ‘Direct Realism’ there is no intermediate object between the thing and its perception
These alternatives give an idea of the possibilities in one or two directions; the present intention is to point to the variety but not to complete it
However, in discussion so far in this section, the underlying view is that knowledge is ‘knowledge-of’ an object which may be called in to question in two related ways. Firstly, it is assumed that to a subjective experience e.g. to a mental picture there corresponds an object. This appears to be obvious except for the assumption, so trivial in a way as normally avoid notice, that the mental picture is a precise picture of –the nature of– reality. Note that some correspondence between mental pictures and the world is not being called into question but whether the pictures provide an adequate view of reality as it is and not just for practical purposes; specifically, it is being questioned whether mental pictures provide an adequate view, not just of the world, but of the relation between subject and object. Such questions may be seen to constitute a motivation for Kantian idealism in which subjective experience e.g. the mental pictures are products of the being of the subject i.e. of the intuition – which does not imply that there is no relation to the world. A second way in which to question the knowledge as knowledge-of picture is to think through the process of cognition on the basis of the knowledge-of picture itself. In that picture, perturbations – sometimes called signals – emanate from the ‘object,’ impinge upon the surface of the sensory organ, are absorbed in some way and transformed into nerve impulses and the system of impulses is coordinated and integrated – while the physiological process is intricate and complex in detail what is really difficult is their interpretation as or correspondence to subjective phenomena – in the brain and the result is the subjective experience. Now, what exactly is the object? There is a world ‘out there’ and, we have decided that, on the basis of the mental picture that it is e.g. ‘the ball’ that is the object and not the first source of the signals e.g. the lighting, not the processes that made the ball, not the signals emanating from the ball, not the complex system of receptors, transmitters, integrators in the brain or the signal as it is processed in that system… Again it is the picture that defines what the object is and this profound self-reference is hidden by the apparent identity of the circular reference. In fact, what is perceived as the object is determined by pragmatics: the needs of the organism as originating in evolution, as expressed in its adapted form, determine what are and what are not perceived as objects. In the implied view, object and subject are approximate ideas that find their real form in the adapted binding of organism and environment whose pragmatics results in the approximate forms as adequate
Consciousness is –the having of– experience. Consciousness occurs in shades of immediacy [and intensity or feeling which is significant but discussed elsewhere.] Focal consciousness is immediate and outside focal consciousness is peripheral consciousness; the distinction constitutes a continuum. I have argued that all awareness is somewhere in this continuum. The individual may be conscious of consciousness i.e. consciousness appears as an ‘object.’ Although consciousness of consciousness is necessary to be able to talk of consciousness –except to be able to talk of consciousness as an hypothesis devoid of meaning– it does not follow that awareness of one’s own mental states is necessary for consciousness. For human individuals, being in a state where both world and consciousness appear in the focal field is at least common and this appears to be part of human nature although it is not fully transparent whether and to what degree this is cultivated. Possibilities –four in number but this fact is not important here– arise according as consciousness as object and consciousness of that ‘object’ are focal or peripheral. Perhaps, in that awareness is a relation it is also reflexive; in this case reflexivity would be constitutive of awareness; further, there would then be no distinction between awareness and consciousness except that ‘consciousness’ might be reserved for focal consciousness. The foregoing is on a phenomenal account of consciousness and as we have seen my account admits of no interpretation that excludes this account. The typical representational account of consciousness is an exclusive alternative. It allows awareness that is not experience. It then requires that consciousness is awareness of one’s own mental states. It follows that, in that account, consciousness may occur without experience; some writers e.g. Ned Block have labeled this a-consciousness or consciousness that is available for action. It does not rule out that consciousness may occur as experience; this is then labeled phenomenal consciousness. The two kinds of consciousness would clearly overlap since phenomenal consciousness may be available for action. Some writers hold that, while conceptually distinct, the two kinds of consciousness are referentially or empirically identical – I think that David Chalmers holds that this is probably the case. As I have written many times, the representational account as presented here is a massive confusion. Consciousness is phenomenal consciousness; awareness is phenomenal awareness – the account of the first part of this paragraph. What some writers refer to as a-consciousness is, on a naïve but at least suggestive material or behavioral account, to brain states or to intelligence. However, the use of ‘consciousness’ in ‘a-consciousness’ is a categorial error – one could say that the error is egregious I would not say that because the error is suggested by and – almost – constitutive of materialism, the result of its tacit sway and, in some ways, made invisible by the referential identity, in the naïve account, of – or among – brain and phenomenal states
This is a proposed new division that replaces ‘Ethics’ in Journey in Being
… and generalizes ethics to axia; but asks whether ethics and aesthetics [axia] are identical
… and, naturally incorporates group action or politics; and political philosophy or theory
… and contributions of philosophy; history; sociology; economics; political science – see introductory comments to Chapter 6 on Political Science from Eds. Robert E. Goodin and Philip Pettit, A Companion to Contemporary Political Philosophy, 1993; and legal studies to political philosophy
… and, the structure of institutions and the ethics of social and institutional action
… and, questions of relations between ethics and political theory
Currently, these topics are labeled ‘Topic 6’ but may, later, be divided
I.e. being is inherently knowing and ethical. I.e. ethic inheres in being as opposed to being merely a constraint or consideration of being. The nature of ethics; development of ethics and applications. The study from the point of view of organic unity is opposed to a merely symbolic isolation; however, this enhances and places previous understanding and does not replace it. Finally, ‘ethics’ will be broadened to ‘axiology’ or theory of value; this has already been done to some extent; this will be enhanced by explicit consideration and –perhaps brief– treatment of the range of value topics. The following considerations are also very relevant: to what extent –in principle and in detail– are ethics and axiology identical; and, are metaphysics –including knowledge and its ‘theory’– and axiology distinct topics in principle? The latter question regards the famous and hoary fact / value distinction! All the axiology / ethics issues and questions have already received some address but are now falling into clearer relief
Ethics – individual, public or social and institutional and so on, universal
Ethics and political / social theory
Of course, this implies the co-question, “What is ethics?” or, “What is it to be ethical?”
The immediate occasion for the thought is the often widespread substitution, in a variety of social situations, of the appearance of ethical behavior for true ethical behavior
Maintaining an appearance is itself a constraint on behavior and often results in behavior that is at least partially the same as ethical behavior
Additionally, I speculate that the attempt to give an appearance of ethical behavior requires some degree of simulation of true ethical thought and intent and this results in some degree of true ethical intent
Now some questions:
Do all human motivations and actions fall under the umbrella of the ethical? I.e. does every motive or action have an ethical dimension? If the answer is “no” then there are some motives and actions that are neither right nor wrong. I could, for example, say that the play of children is not inherently ethical although some acts within the play of children are ethical and that adult overview of the play of children is ethical. Some of the reasons that the play of children lacks an inherent ethical dimension are also reasons why some adult play is ethical: adults are not completely self determined; and while children are in the process of developing or refining a sense of ethics, adults may need a holiday from morals for rejuvenation and in order that they may re-enter the ethical arena with fresh energy – this may, of course, be a statement regarding the seriousness with which morals may be held rather than the intrinsic aspect of any moral sense. Regardless, for an adult to continue to play while a neighbor or passer by is injured is, at least, a moral deficit. Well, then, there are always people who are starving, dying of AIDS, suffering the ravages of war – so should anyone ever play? It is probably true that all cessation of play would not help those in pain. Additionally, the existence of evil in the world does not imply that the only good is effort toward the cessation of evil. Rather, the intrinsic good – including the enjoyment of play – should also be cultivated. Some may be producers of what is good and fine [art] and others may be uplifted by it. All may / should participate in some simple and intrinsic good and enjoyment. There are occasions for solemnity when we remember those who suffer. All elements enter into consciousness and then into the unconscious where they are held and which inform and effect behavior: when there is an opportunity to have some intrinsic good that is enjoyed; when there is an occasion to alleviate suffering that is undertaken – all, perhaps with a lightness of spirit or, at least, without an excess of solemnity. Going to church on Sundays has been criticized; but, in the best of situations and that excludes hypocrisy, one cannot be in church at all times or consciously occupied with morals at all times but the effect of church enters into behavior both consciously and unconsciously [except for ministry, without which there would be no institutional religion, centering one’s life around religion is, in some ways, a peculiar phenomenon]
So what, then, is it to be ethical? There is the ethical sense – the rather innate sense under which right is done, wrong avoided; then there is reflection upon the ethical sense and ethical behavior – which is significantly occasioned, in the first place, by changing social and other arrangements so that the ethical sense and tradition which includes myth and stories and, also, explicit morals become inadequate; and, then there is the cultivation of ethical thought in somewhat free floating form as in the branch of philosophy called ethics and divided into ethics and meta-ethics. However, if the ethical sense is regarded as real ethics, then reflection, myth and philosophy are meta-ethical; and, in this sense, the meaning of “meta-ethical” is different from the traditional meaning in which “meta-ethics” is a branch of ethics / philosophy. Since the ethical sense is both intrinsic and occurs in interaction with others the ethical is both in the sense and in the inter-human effects upon the sense and that includes the stories, myth and philosophy and, therefore, the distinction between ethics and meta-ethics is somewhat arbitrary even if clear from the disciplinary point of view. What is the domain and sway of the ethical? I.e. is every action, motive and intent ethical and should one always carry a concern for morals… or is there such a thing as pure behavior [dancing because dance is enjoyed, sex because sex is wonderful…] and not tinged, over and above the enjoyment, with a moral sense? There is an implication here that ethics should be pluralistic: hedonism and utilitarianism, for example, are not good as monistic ethics but may co-exist and are irreducible
Some from Division 1, Topic 6 above
Later: from Division 4 below, especially theory; from elsewhere in this document; from Journey in Being
Since ethics does not tell us what institutions bring about what is desired –the good or the right– or, it is said, principles of community i.e. communal action and communal distribution of value e.g. economic… it is said, then, that ethics implies little about political philosophy or theory
Of course, it is acknowledged that ethical principles are at the heart of political theory but the claim is that there are various issues especially the one of institutions –political, administrative, economic, legal, educational– on which ethics is silent
That is how it may seem but not necessarily how it must be; there may be ways that can be uncovered to go from ethics to political theory… one trivial is that the ethics of right action implies that the nature of political process is an ‘end’ in itself i.e. questions of ‘efficacy of political institutions’ do not necessarily override the ethical consideration that the good involves or may involve all persons much more so than envisaged in actual or the most efficient institutions. Just as ‘Business Ethics’ is a topic in applied ethics, so, politics has a clearly ethical dimension and, further, depending on the –kind of– ethics held is essentially ethical and can not be overridden –in principle– by questions of institutional organization and efficacy
The importance of this point, such as it may be, includes:
Division results in abortion of analysis that is easily obscured by the rigor of the aborted and therefore simple case
Both disciplines –ethics and political theory– benefit
The fluctuations, the vacuum – witness current political theory especially that of the Continent, and the over-intellectualizations of political theory acquire –at least– perspective
The point is enhanced when ethics-politics-society is seen from a full perspective of being
Given the difficulties of all political systems, especially of democracy and its promise, what are the fundamental joint social, economic, political and ethical issues? I am not going to attempt an answer right here except to suggest that the questions include the following concerns: human good and human play, kind and degree of arrangement productive of the good, the concerns of stability and an anarchistic arrangement in an implicitly or explicitly fascistic world, the size of political units, the means of procurement of goods, and living arrangements; and the meta-issue of whether human intelligence can substitute for or improve upon natural arrangements by which I do not mean to exclude intelligence, institution or artifact but only to say that such intelligences, institutions and artifacts are always in interaction whose forces are not fully subject to intelligence… and to say that they are individually and together in interaction with the world at large and that includes the realm of what is called nature whose forces are also not fully subject to intelligence and artifact. [The systems of mutual interaction and interaction with the world can be viewed as one system]
Date-wise, these comments are out of sequence but are placed here since they relate to the previous point
The question of the possibility of theory is as follows. One idea of theory is that it is a statement of reality. Of course, theory is more than that for the idea behind theory is to state general truths and reveal general patterns and, so theory is effective in [1] providing insight and [2] representing much data with a much smaller set of data together with the theory. The assumption is that patterns exist either universally or locally and so the theory is either universal or local. The question of the assumption is valid and pertinent to the use and exaltation This, however, is not the real question of theory being posed here
Suppose that we want to do something with theory. On the assumption that theory is about the world or a phase of the world we can then say that if so and so then from the theory we can assert such and such. However, perception and thought are not essentially like that. The origins of perception and thought are in interaction with the world rather than being about the world. Later, due, in part, to validity, we come to have that kind of picture of the interaction of thought and action. But the picture is not universal. Not only is there the Wittgensteinian question of the finality or completability of theory, its extractability from use but there is also the question of whether thought is about the world… of course it is but that is only to a degree and not universal. In the origin, thought and language were mediums of affecting action and others [and self] and the exaltation of aboutness came later with the growth of human intelligence and the origin and elaboration of language. But what is valid in some domains is not universalizable and so there is the question of whether design in politics is and can be rational
An occasion for the questions is the lack of a match between what we think the world should be like and what it is like. Frustration is endemic but it must have at root an assumption that the situation could be changed. But can it? One can have faith that it can or hold to a skeptical position. But the truth may be beyond faith and skepticism
In addition to the inseparability of thought / communication addressed here, there are also questions of whether knowledge, command or imperative, ethics and politics and so on are separable
Similarly, the foundation in being has implications for the classic and modern problems of metaphysics [including the question of which problems are fundamental]
It is desired that all –at least most– essential topics have already been considered so that what is needed here is –primarily– listing, overview and system
[A one sentence reference to this point has been added to the Prologue §Horizons and Mileposts as ¶-3]
There has been a feeling that philosophy cannot instruct or even talk to science
The formal roots appear to be in a number of places including the thought of Wittgenstein who held that, Tractacus-Logico Philosophicus
“4.111 Philosophy is not one of the natural sciences
(The word “philosophy” must mean something which stands above or below but not alongside the natural sciences.)
Here, above and below do not [I think] have the connotation of superior or inferior but, rather, essentially distinct. There is no argument that there are distinctions to be had but it does not follow that the lines of demarcation are sharp and absolute and that there is no interaction
Other sources of the idea that philosophy cannot instruct science are in, for example, Richard Rorty, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, who holds that philosophy is edifying [Wittgenstein held that it is therapeutic] but does not instruct or hold court over the other disciplines. There is, of course, truth to this but, again, there appears to be in the background some notion of absolute distinction and some hesitation to straddle boundaries – boundaries that, if taken as absolute, are artificial
Further sources of the idea are in cultural relativism, the incommensurability of theories even within science, in the dominance of science, in the objection of scientists to philosophers “philosophisizing about science,” in the lack of scientific training and familiarity with current scientific thinking and vocabulary that characterizes modern academic philosophy and university education in philosophy
However, even within the halls of science and despite disclaimers [e.g. Dirac’s injunction that it is the mathematics and not philosophy or concepts that determine the reality of theoretical physics,] it remains that there are concepts in science and that the scientist must from time to time wear a hat labeled “philosophical thought in progress.” Thus notion that science and philosophy cannot and should not communicate that seems to characterize much of modern science and philosophy is a result of territorialism and ignorance and is extremely artificial. This is not at all to say that science and philosophy must always be in communication; rather, huge amounts of scientific and philosophical activity can validly be carried on independently of each other. The point is, rather, that communication and, in some areas of endeavor, not only necessary, but actually does occur even when injunctions against it are in place and the way in which it occurs is e.g. when a scientist takes up the clarification of what it is that he or she is talking about
At various places in Journey in Being there is communication between science and philosophy. Perhaps the starkest one is, quoting from above
“General comments on the approach to understanding through the void / nothingness
An approach through which any culture, civilization or age can embed its special forms of knowledge, art, science, religion and magic in the absolute and the universal”
Which shows the embedding of our phase-epoch of the universe in the void and therefore a foundation of the physics of this world in ideas
Other places are in the development of the cosmology [cosmology “instructs” philosophy in showing models of creation; philosophy “instructs” cosmology by revealing the models as a form,] and, similarly, in the treatment of mind where, additionally, analysis of emotion and other mental functions as concepts enhances both understanding and science
[Wittgenstein; but the arrow of implication is bi-directional]
While contemplation reminds us of the ‘greatness’ of the uni-verse – inspires us with beauty and awe…
There is no search for questions that exists without a search for fulfillment of the questions; which search, the seeking of answers, re-emphasizes awe, reminds of the beauty in the soul, fulfils our being
It is the possibility of answers that creates questions. It is in overcoming limits, not in stasis or static wonder, that we first conceive and experience the ultimate
I stand against delusions of insignificance and ignorance, the modern tendency to exalt in ignorance as a substitute for awe and adventure that is foisted upon us by a conception of the nature of knowledge that is useful in its application but stands impotent in its projection to the ultimate. Such delusions must be stood against just as much as delusions of grandiosity within the sphere of application. And it must be remembered that while proximately important that sphere is ultimately a speck even though it is our world in the present
I have addressed this question of the nature of knowledge, above in On Platonic Argument in particular and at large in Journey in Being
…an important topic and a brief sub-section in Division 1 of Journey in Being which will be imported to this document. Here is one possible placement for Systematic Metaphysics and if placed here treatment may be brief since much is developed in Theory of Being or General Metaphysics. If placed here, the approach will be to point out what is necessary to complete the treatment – if anything at all; and in the latter case all that will be needed is to point out the variety of systems, their interrelations and equivalences, and their adequacy i.e. the degree to which all actual and possible experience and being is included
‘Systematic’ implies the presence of a system of the universe i.e. of all being e.g. Aristotelian, Descartes-Spinozian, Leibnizian, Lockean, Kant-Schopenhauerian, Hegelian [and the systems of the other idealists,] Spencerian, Bergsonian, Whiteheadian, Alexanderian…
I.e. a conceptual system that is logical, coherent, applicable and adequate in the sense of A. N. Whitehead, Process and Reality, 1929
It may be useful to study the habits of thought that haunt Cartesian and related philosophy that Whitehead attempted to abandon – Process and Reality, p. xiii of the 1978 Free Press [Macmillan] corrected edition eds. David Ray Griffin and Donald W. Sherburne; it is necessary, however, to go beyond Whitehead in the following ways
Logic should fall out of the system – perhaps
As much as possible of the detail of the system should fall out of fundamental principles and the trivial yet powerful existential principle that what exists is possible
It may be unnecessary to posit power and presence
The system should be adequate not only with respect to actual being but to all possible being; the conditions for actual being [this world or phase-epoch] should fall out as a special case defined by appropriately chosen characteristics. Thus the system would contain actual and transcendent elements
An apology is necessary because of the history of attack upon systematic and transcendent metaphysics
Every cultural environment presupposes some metaphysics; everyday life as well as science… this can be improved by exposing i.e. formulating it and criticizing it
Systematic metaphysics is speculative or hypothetico-deductive [and corrective] in exactly the same way that science is; and in exactly the same way that all understanding is. The structure of the world is not revealed by empirical activity
How to proceed in systematic metaphysics is exquisitely laid out in Whitehead’s Process and Reality
Systematic metaphysics points to more than knowledge but also to the potential of our being; in systematizing, every element of our world is viewed with fresh eyes, alleviating the dulling of repetitive monotony of custom, re-vitalizing ideas that have become flat under secular life and ‘secular metaphysics’
Wittgenstein, despite his argument with the positivists, despite his mysticism was a strong positivist. He made definite and deep contributions; but, his argument against metaphysics was based in positivism. Whitehead’s analysis of metaphysics is deeper. It is the old opposition: charisma versus patriarchalism [Wittgenstein was charismatic in his positivistic patriarchalism,] the shaman against fear, Jesus against Rome…
If no one writes a systematic philosophy there will be no systematic philosophy
The progress of civilization and the concept of the human soul and the highest and deepest in humankind have depended upon an intuition of the hidden world that may be made explicit in a systematic metaphysics
The greater space given, here, to this section is because here we emphasize what is [to be] new
As noted above, this aspects of this topic could appear in one or more of the following topics: Theory of Being, Knowledge, the present section – The Problems of Metaphysics or even somewhere in General Cosmology which includes actual and physical cosmology; the point may be repeated in the stated topics; note that if it occurs in more than one of the topics, different aspects may be treated in the different sections
Issues include: showing the entire range in principle without completing in an Encyclopedic way – Where should the divisions of the classic encyclopaedic formulations be placed?
A history of such formulations has been considered in Evolution and Design. The work of Aristotle may be considered to be encyclopaedic and followed by the French Encyclopaedists and Encyclopaedia Britannica. The content of an encyclopaedia is not the world but knowledge of the world. The objective is to study as far as possible the entire range of being, experience and knowledge
The original arrangement of the Propaedia of the Britannica follows. I have given only those details which are to be changed or omitted:
1. Matter and energy
2. The earth
3. Life
4. Human life: human evolution; the organism – see ‘Life’ for details, includes health, disease and medicine; behavior and experience – attention and perception, emotion and motivation, development and learning, intelligence, cognition and thought, personality and the self
5. Society and culture: social groups and peoples, populations, distributions and nations; culture and its components; symbol and communication – language and languages of the world, names, speech and writing; social organization and change; wealth and economics; politics and government; the law; education; subsistence and leisure
6. Art: literature, theater and cinema, music, dance, architecture and design of population centers or urban design; sculpture; drawing, painting, printmaking and photography; and decorative and functional arts
7. Technology
8. Religion
9. History: Prehistoric peoples and cultures; Ancient Southwest Asia, North Africa and Europe; Medieval Europe, North Africa and Southwest Asia; Peoples and Traditional Civilizations of East, Central, South, and Southeast Asia; Sub-Saharan Africa to 1885; Pre-Columbian America; The Modern World to 1920; The World Since 1920
10. Knowledge; logic; mathematics; science; history and the humanities; and philosophy
I include the system as described: to show at least one system and to show what may go wrong with such a system
Here is a preliminary collapsible outline of ‘Britannica’ for use in ‘Modified Britannica:’ Outline of Knowledge
I have made some modifications to the main divisions of the Propaedia of the Britannica as follows. First, three super divisions are laid over the structure of the Britannica where they are implicit: A. Knowledge – here, knowledge concerns knowledge of knowledge. In the Britannica, symbol and language are considered under communication in Division 5; here they are allowed to remain there as that is a natural place to consider the natural languages but the nature of symbol and language is included here. Mathematics could equally be considered to be about the world [forms] as an instrument of knowledge; therefore the topic of ‘forms’ has been added to Division 1. As such it is somewhat artificial to include philosophy since it is traditionally largely about the world; however the modern analytic emphasis in philosophy is about epistemology, and the limits of mind as a knowing instrument, and about the nature of symbol and language and their limits; this consideration is allowed to stand and is remedied by inclusion of metaphysics in Division 1. The remaining super divisions are B. Knowledge of the World, and C. Artifact
Division 10 has become Division 0; the symbol as a primary artifact of knowledge is placed first and numbered ‘0’ to emphasize the distinction. Division 9, History, has moved up to become Division 6; although history is riddled with interpretation it still has a natural place with knowledge of the world. Additionally, the interpretation of history and other is considered under the division of knowledge. I have used the organization of the Columbia History of the World Which I prefer. The division on religion, originally the 8th division has been placed before art to emphasize the natural relation of the sentiments of art and religion; this relation is based in history and suggests an enrichment of the emotional and symbolic content of both art and religion without requiring their identity
The Britannica system is rather comprehensive but also extremely parochial in some ways especially in its treatment of psychology where it is morbidly based in the modern academic curriculum; in discussion of society… anything pertaining to the human soul despite the division on religion. It is encyclopaedic without touching the heart of being; accordingly I have made some changes to ‘behavior and experience’ under human life and added the word ‘numinous’ which includes the idea of the spiritual to the section on religion. It could be argued that that is not the purpose of an encyclopaedia but an encyclopaedia has no purpose other than those given to it by its creators and users and as implied by the tradition; we may ask “Is the production of an encyclopaedia an advance or an impediment?” By approaching also the heart of being, an encyclopedia begins to remove ‘impediment’
There is an obvious arbitrariness to the arrangement. Any actual arrangement is necessarily arbitrary; some arrangement is necessary. The core concept to the arrangement, though not necessarily assumed as fact, is a material basis of the world. Alternately, one could start with the void; this is more general because the matter of the Britannica is the matter of this universe. In a system starting from the void ‘matter’ might be replaced by the ‘actual.’ As another alternative the organization of knowledge could be based in the experience of an individual; the body [matter] is the actuality of the ‘soul;’ the material universe is the realm of the body; the range of knowledge is the intuition [Kant] enhanced by placing the individual and his or her capacities [symbol…] in the stream of being [discovery, creation… while the Kantian and many other conceptions place hu-man in a static world, the world and all it contains, including hu-man, is dynamic and it is in overcoming limits that we first conceive and experience the ultimate]
The world is divided up into three ‘systems:’ knowledge, world, and artifact. In fact, of course, both knowledge and artifact are part of the world but the distinction is convenient
The contents of the encyclopedia are Knowledge of Knowledge, Knowledge of the World and Knowledge of Artifact but, since this is obvious, it is not emphasized
A. Knowledge
To the extent that knowledge is artifactual it could also be placed under ‘artifact’
0. Knowledge itself: symbol and language; logic; mathematics; science; history and the humanities; and philosophy – including metaphysics of the world, of knowledge [epistemology,] and of judgment which includes value [ethics and aesthetics which may be considered to be indistinct]
B. World
1. A. Metaphysics: metaphysics of being and general cosmology with relation and application to actual and physical cosmology – ‘origin’ of time, matter as the actual, and basis of the quantum vacuum; and metaphysics of forms with consideration of symbol, language, logic and mathematics; metaphysics of science, history and art and religion
B. Matter and energy: time; constituents of matter; energy, radiation, states and transformations of matter including dynamics; cosmology
2. The earth: its properties, structure and composition; its envelope – the atmosphere and hydrosphere; its surface features – geography, soils, earthquakes and volcanism; origins and history of the earth including its formation, development of continents, landforms, its waters and atmosphere, and eras of geologic time
3. Life: nature, diversity, origin and evolution; molecular basis of life; life and probability – out of infinite possibility life is a sub-infinity that, due to its self-perpetuation, is more stable than other conditions; structure and function of organisms; behavior of organisms; the biosphere including ecology, populations, disease and death, ecosystems and interactions – ‘competition’ and co-existence as community, and the place of human life in the biosphere
4. A. Human life: human evolution; the organism – see ‘Life’ for details, includes health, disease and medicine. The person as a categorial being tied into the categories of the world: bound categories – memory, inner or simple feeling and drives and perception
B. The person: as a categorial being [soul] tied into the categories of the world: presence or [the capacity for] experience as fundamental; bound categories – memory, inner or simple feeling and drives, simple sensation and perception and associated categories of space, time, causation and humor; free categories – iconic and symbolic, cognition and thought, humor – again, and art as the categorial combination of feeling, iconic and symbolic thought and humor… human being as an agent of free creation; growth: the body as objectification of being, development and learning
5. History: I prefer the organization in John A. Garraty and Peter Gay, eds., The Columbia History of the World, 1972 to that of the Britannica even though the two are similar. The Columbia History is divided into the main periods: The Ancient World, The World: 500 – 1500, Toward Modernity, The Age of Revolution, and The Modern World. The division on the ancient world includes an account of prehistory starting with the origin of the present physical universe through the evolution of homo sapiens; all divisions are sub-divided according to some principle that fits the case – often geographical; the history displays the balance between chance and necessity, between interpretation and actuality, between isolation and interaction; it shows the concurrent greatness and the emptiness of the ‘great’
6. Society and culture: sociology; social groups and peoples, society as community, populations, distributions and nations; culture and its components; symbol and communication – language and languages of the world, names, speech and writing; social organization and change; wealth and economics; politics and government – and basis in the nature of human being… and the world i.e. in freedom and limitation… political philosophy, political theory and institutions; the law; education; human aspiration and society [including subsistence and leisure]
C. Artifact
7. Religion: nature of religion and religious or numinous experience, symbolism and iconography; the religious life – doctrines, dogmas, beliefs, rites and ceremonies, offices and orders; theology – study and theory of religion including theology as religion; religions – prehistoric, ancient peoples, Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Shinto, Taoism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Zoroastrianism and Parsiism
8. Art and the arts: art as the induction of states of mind and intention –especially the will to higher being or becoming– through symbolic, artifactual and dramatic i.e. all categorial means; literature, theater and cinema, music, dance, architecture and design of population centers or urban design; sculpture; drawing, painting, printmaking and photography; and decorative and functional arts
9. Technology and its nature and development: elements of technology – for energy, tools and machines, measurement and control, raw materials, production; major fields – agriculture and food, the industries, construction, transportation, information and communication, military, the urban community, earth and space exploration
The purposes to including and encyclopaedic system are
To have a system handy
As the basis of a map of being, experience and knowledge
To show how such a system may be a complete map – based in a Theory of Being and Cosmology, in fact generated by such a system; and, how in turn, the search for a complete map informs the Theory of Being. To consider the twin question “To what extent is the range complete and how such completeness may be conceived and evaluated?” Question of human knowledge versus knowledge. Of course, completeness will not be regarded as not obtaining on account of gaps of fact and detail
To have an accounting of where the different essential topics are treated in principle in Journey in Being – it is not necessary to have an actual complete compilation, that is far from the purpose of Journey in Being and would be a detriment
To help in evaluating the significance of the previous point
Currently, ‘The Chain of Being’ is a planned elaboration of Division 3. While I plan to import parts of Division 3 to Division 1, ‘The Chain of Being’ will remain in Division 3
However, this location may be an appropriate place to review the completeness of the ‘chain’
The following will constitute a ‘complete’ set and a foundation of the Journey [metaphysics / study]
A list of import concepts that constitute the universe of metaphysics; see Words
The idea of a history of ideas may fit here but see Remarks on the History of Philosophy and related sections
This will be a new topic. At present the content is undecided except that the topic will be an occasion to review what has been accomplished: the individual accomplishments and the synthesis –and its extent– and to note the prospect: implications, applications, further developments
… and, especially, implications for Divisions 2 - 4
The revisions in the following treatment significantly due to Journey Notes dated 11.12.03
In summary, the changes in outline are as follows: the considerations on Knowledge are consolidated and placed after the topics of Being, Cosmology, and Mind and the Categories. There is no present plan to change the approximate place in the text of the remaining treatments except that ‘Ethics’ has been brought forward one place and comes before ‘Problems in Metaphysics’ which will now be the final topic. This is reasonable for the completion of ‘Ethics’ will enhance the treatment of the ‘Problems.’ A final topic ‘Review and Prospect’ has been added
“I mistrust all systematizers and I avoid them. The will to system is a lack of integrity.” Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols
I appreciate Nietzsche’s point… to a point. Nietzsche has forgotten that his body is a system in a process of becoming and decay in a line of evolution embedded in the universe that is equivalent to the void or to Brahman
Every system is on the way
The completion of every system opens up the possibility of its criticism and is new ground for destruction
Without system there would be no ‘Death of God’
Experiments in the Transformation of Being has a large part that is against system. It is the Journey in the Stream
What is most real to me, even while I labor at my work, is to be-in the world…
I will probably leave the title unchanged but mention the possible alternatives and reasons for consideration
Transformation is not only of ‘mental state’ but also mental form and physical state and form i.e. the classification is sufficient to the entire range of possible transformations of being including such transformations [if possible] as void ® non-void ® individual ® virus ® universe ® void…
I.e. the experiments are not ‘mere’ experiments but real transformations of the very BEING of the being; but the experiments remain ‘experimental’ in the following ways: transformation requires expectation/hypothesis-trial-comparison-correction and confirmation of metaphysics/ideas/variety/politics in the experimental way
Primary: the experiments are an essential part of the Journey in Being
Interact with / confirm knowledge / metaphysics
The essence of the dynamics to go to ‘Being’ / ‘Mind’ of Division 1 – especially as Historical Being [re: Being and Time.] The main conclusions and implications for the experiments to remain here in Division 2
Dynamics of Being is to be explicitly based in the theories and ‘dimensions’ of being / mind… and, in turn, the dynamics ‘enhances’ being / mind and the understanding of being / mind
The topic is Awareness or Mind and the nature, kinds and ways [methods] of experiments in awareness / mind including the dynamics and classical systems
Awareness is not restricted to passive experience and, so, thought, design, discovery are included
Relation between awareness / mind and being-as-such; transition between awareness-in-particular and being-as-such
Note it is not necessary to refer to ‘body’ even though it is clearly involved
Review: The Periods of Indian Philosophy
Journey in Being: sections on mediation
Being conscious of every act in itself – every experience is its own end, living in direct and constant mindfulness of one’s body
Total rest, mindfulness, presence, awakeness
Buddha, “I am awake”
Sitting like the Buddha, mindfulness in action, breathing; half-smile and presence
On independence, my true self or being, my appearance before I was born, someone dead who is close to my heart
…and: emptiness, compassion for the hated – the most hated, lack of light and suffering, detached action, and being in the one-universe [non-abandonment]
Just as the essence of the dynamics of being is to go to being / mind in Division 1, so for the Theory of Dreams and of Hypnosis; this will unify and much to the Theory of Being / Mind. Practical details necessary for experiment will remain here in Division 2
…and similarly for theory behind perception/vision-quest, meditation, yoga, journey, experiments with body
The topic is Being / Becoming and the nature, kinds and ways [methods] of experiments in being / becoming including the dynamics and classical systems
Note the arbitrariness of the boundary between experience and becoming and need to synthesize the treatments or sections
Gñana Yoga ® Division 1
Karma Yoga ® Division 2, 4
Raja Yoga ® Division 2
Bhakti Yoga ® Division 2
The system of the Gita appears to omit transformations of body as such which = Tantra?
I.e. the classic Hero-Quest
Remembering the threefold aspects of mind according to current i.e. c. 2000 philosophy of mind: experience, attitude and action… but also remembering the Journey in Being argument regarding experience as the core / initial character of mind and the twofold division under experience into attitude and action… and remembering the desirability – but not necessity – from some considerations of the elimination of the word ‘mind,’ we can classify the present sub-section ‘Awareness / Experience’ and the next ‘Being / Becoming’ as follows:
Awareness / Experience ® Attitude
Being / Becoming ® Action
Where it should be remembered that both attitude and action may transform not only ‘mental state’ but also mental form and physical state and form i.e. the classification is sufficient to the entire range of possible transformations of being including such transformations [if possible] as virus ® universe
Consider a total system based in Metaphysics, especially Theory of Being, Cosmology and Mind [presence / experience]
Rationalize, integrate and incorporate the Classic Systems
Metaphysics: the dimensions and understanding of mind / being
Metaphysics / knowledge as informing versus interacting with transformations in being
Action
Add the following distinction if it is not already in Journey in Being: metaphysics based versus pure action
Note: include Life as Journey, as Experiment, as Project… I.e. Being in Time in the sense of Heidegger: as something whose ‘meaning’ is a trajectory over time, as neither end nor purpose nor seeking nor building nor the trajectory; but as the interaction among and integration / overview / understanding of all these elements
Not ‘Plans and results’ but ‘Results, Plans’
The basic organization-concept of the section: Life-Possible/Hypothetical-Society-Machine; which may be the basis of a reworking of this division
Potential and hypothetical being
And the theory of society as being
Theory of machines
Theory and concept of computation and networking
… and ontology: machine as mind, life, or being
The following is nothing new but needs reconsideration
Experiments in the Variety of Being
[Chain of Being]
Being: A Theory of Kinds and Experiments with Select Kinds
Chain of being is new
Kinds: theory and experiment
…and the ‘principle of plenitude,’ originating with the early Greeks, that all possibilities will be realized
Task. The two sections ‘Society’ and ‘Machines and Technology’ have been demoted one level so as to be able to restructure the ‘Chain of Being’
Objectives
Ontology; theory; implementation
Note the new title Action, Charisma and History and its long alternate Action and Charisma; Influence, Patriarchalism; and Change: Individuals, Societies, Nature and the Course of History
The basic concept and nature of action-influence and its dimensions; which may be a basis of a reworking of this division
Influence and change
Charisma and patriarchalism
Problem of significance
Theory and concepts
Concept, possibility and justification of theory
Social theory; sociology
Political theory and philosophy
Economics
History
Legal studies i.e. law and justice
The following is nothing new but needs reconsideration
Action, Charisma, Influence and Change… or Action, Charisma, Influence
Delusions of significance and insignificance; the meaning of significance
This heading is one level higher in the current version
The following [local rather than universal] material goes to Phase IV – Social Action etc.
In an attempt to understand the current socio-political situation and process the mood in America has been called a “culture of fear”
A more complete characterization is as follows: fear, suspicion, poverty of the self [spirit,] self-centeredness if not selfishness, adversarial rather than cooperative attitudes, a slave attitude towards the master and to the law. Quick fix solutions are sought. The solution to a problem is often to injure someone: someone else or oneself – “kick some ass” or have “one’s ass whipped” or, even better, have it “whupped.” Law enforcement and law breakers become more and more violent in a cycle of mutual escalation. More than anywhere else in the ‘civilized’ world, people are behind bars [Britain is second.] You argue that this is not true; that punishment and incarceration is a necessary part of keeping our lives, families and living environments safe, is part of the war on crime; e.g. it has been argued by the Department of Justice in Texas where penalties are among the harshest that the harshness of penalties is correlated with a drop in crime rate. Even if true – and it may be true although I question the data collection and interpretation used in politics generally and by Departments of Justice in particular – the general conclusion as to the necessity of harsh penalties and the fear from and war upon crime do not at all follow for it then severely needs to be explained why the crime rate in America with its harshest penal system in the ‘civilized’ world has, by far, the highest crime rate, is by far most violent in its internal relations. And as regards fear and the war upon crime this in large measure, merely a vote getting measure and one that detracts from what politicians ‘should’ be doing especially focusing on equality, on opportunity, on divesting power among the people instead of accumulating and hanging on to it. Casual behavior becomes petty wrongdoing and [then] petty wrongdoing becomes severely criminal. Meanwhile true criminals [measured by amount of harm done] are free to go about their business. Attitudes to justice are characterized by punishment, revenge, and, instead of magnanimity, a pettiness that diminishes everyone; government is cut off from the people and, in no small part, because people are cut off from one another and the individual from him or her self. The culture or even cult of fear permits the establishment and nourishment of the master and slave culture, the entrapment of the slave by the master in a life cycle of petty actualities, and the joyous acceptance by the slave of the suppression and impoverishment by the master. Master and slave are distinguished by their physical power; they have in common an unspoken pact to rape the world – without and within – beyond the borders, an exaltation of the trivial, and an impoverishment of meaning – and of meanings, of spirit, of being and of true joy
‘System’ and integration will follow
Possibility of Theory and its Meaning
This will incorporate:
Social theory
Political philosophy and political theory
‘Concepts in politics’ is expanded to political philosophy and theory
In the current version, social theory and political theory have their own level two headings; here they are combined
Plan. Need to Include Sociology, Economics, History, Legal Studies; may add corresponding sub/sections
There is no absolute law
The intended application is to laws created by humans and intended to govern ‘human behavior.’ However, as we have seen, this is also true of ‘natural law.’ It is therefore also of application when attempt is made to con-fuse human and natural law
And therefore, by logic similar to that in showing that there is no natural law, that ‘There is no absolute law’ is not written as a rule or as a law but as a fact
We might write, ‘There is no absolute law but LOGOS.’ This is distinct from ‘There is no absolute law’ only when LOGOS is realized
There is no intent behind the statement to encourage either law breaking or disrespect of any kind [if the most despicable and the most pitiable should be respected then so should all humans and all intents including law and its intents. To think otherwise reduces the principle of respect to mere narcissism]
The primary intents are, first, to state the fact and second, to improve the law and its application
A secondary intent is to resist the use of the law as a covert and devious instrument of control
The following considerations will be integrated into the new version of Journey in Being
The real question is ‘What is the correct relation between theory and action and practice?’ And, what is the correct proportion of theory and practice
It is not implied that there is a calculus of relation and proportion; or that there is a fixed ‘answer’ or any answer other than an abiding concern with the issue
Even in small e.g. hunter-gatherer societies individuals ask, and perhaps more frequently than we do for we are conditioned to let others think for us, ‘How should we do this?’
What is the evolution of the earlier stage into the present?
How do these considerations affect creation and construction in politics?
Characterized by
Reason and principles in abstract
Integration among analyses and disciplines, connection to society often [at least explicitly] absent
Assumption: ‘Everything is visible, everything is expressible and can be known’
The approach is characteristic of the primary places that it is practiced – the English speaking nations of Britain, America, Australia; and Scandinavia – and sufficient to the way that these places view themselves
Relative political and economic stability; well established bureaucracy; welfare state i.e. welfare is considered to be the state’s responsibility; ascendance of science, empiricism, positivism [positive knowledge is the only knowledge and follows the way of science,] analytic philosophy; affairs of the human spirit [the nature of the real, emotion, suffering] are private; the individual is paramount
Characteristics
Accepts those factors that analytic philosophy tends to ignore
Denies the reign of reason alone
The group, society, the community, the nation are important in conditioning thought and determining political values
The purpose of theory is not only to understand the world but to change it; this is simplistic in itself since, ultimately, thought exists only in a context of action but the statement is necessary to counter the opposite stance e.g. as in analytic thought
The tradition of Rousseau, Hegel, Marx, Freud, The Frankfurt School, Deconstructionism, Post-Modernism and the flight from Western History
Deeply affected by the chaos of 19th and 20th century European History and, recently, by the failure of actual Marxist states and the bankruptcy of modern European ideology including neo-Marxism, The Frankfurt School
As a result fractured and despairing of any theory – Jacques Derrida, Jean Francois Lyotard
The idea that is suggested is a study of the alternative approaches to political economy and a priori versus a posteriori justification; and a posteriori interpretation of the a priori
Intellectuals forget that, in social affairs, the connection between ideas – theory – and reality [ends] is necessarily tenuous; given that translation of ideas into reality is experimental, and that ideals are the ideas of some but not of all – that many are not governed by ideals at all, the tenuous connection is logically necessary – as argued e.g. by Karl Popper, The Poverty of Historicism, 1957
Based in reality and based in the limitation of thought, the political idealist should expect thwarting of ideals. Karl Popper suggested, and various analyses claim to show the superiority of democracy in this regard. Is this a posteriori justification? Analysis and experiment are necessary
Again, it is forgotten that over 1000 years passed between the idea of democracy and its actualization – which still, today, remains an incomplete experiment in risk of drowning in its unintended and, perhaps, unnecessary banality; and that 60 years passed between Marx and Marxism; and that labeling a state ‘Marxist’ does not make it so
Perhaps, a significant value of analytic philosophy as a balance, is the de-emphasis of the individual ego; rather avoidance of its exaltation for which idealism is often an excuse. In Europe, war, destitution, the idea – monumental as it truly is, ego, fall and despair are tied up in a cycle that we see today in despair of ideas
…this points to need for respect for the tenuous connection between ideas, construction and action. And to a connection, see below, to the distinction of the right and the good. The theory of the right respects the loose connection between ideas and construction; it honors ideals; it shows the way rather than the end; it is a way out of egotistic idealism; it avoids pseudo-justification of any means to some end… at the same time the theory of the right requires that it not be fully divorced from outcomes
The first flight to theoretical ideals in Europe is, perhaps, a reaction to the devastation of its wars; and born also of the romantic spirit that touches its theories to the core. This is immediately a set up for the fall; as is the magnitude of the European social experiment. And ideas of the late 20th century and today lie in the shadows of the thought of Herder, Rousseau, Hegel and Marx
Accidents, complexity and the ineffectiveness of ideas, evil in its banal forms [Arendt,] the existence of harmful individuals and forces are among the sometime agents of despair. The resolution is considered action, feeling, in the midst of chaos and the real
Political philosophy [analytical] identifies two theories or frameworks for revaluation [normative i.e. what to do] in politics
The Theory of the Good
The Theory of the Right
…is about values, not action or institutions, and even when universal – though unlike utilitarianism may also be plural – which is desirable, do not always prescribe paths of action or institutions
…is about choices and, essentially, choices are always of action and not of [good] ends which may be in mind but are not deterministically determined by actions
Values exist in a [dynamic, evolving, emerging] hierarchy and the highest value that prescribes action is the one, roughly, that determines choice of action
Within the practice of the right which is the honoring of values [deontological ethics] there is a place for consequentialism which promotes values and exceptions can be made to deontology. Why? Promotion of a value is may be honoring it. And, ‘Thou shalt not kill’ does not have a clear meaning! Perhaps by typing at my keyboard I am ignoring actualities that result in death – the cumulative effect of my action and similar action by others. Am I killing? Why is being unaware or pretending to be unaware of an omission that leads to evil better than being evil?
However, the good may be used to justify all kinds of actions
But, the good and the right cannot be absolutely distinguished
As a general principle we could adopt the maxim ‘first the right, then the good’
The following are often divorced:
Problems – issues; suffering e.g. hunger; opportunities [none should suppress consideration of others]
Practice
Theory
Some degree of divorce is inevitable but what is the practical extent and theoretical nature of integration
In writing of his experiences in politics in the UK, Bryan Magee, in Confessions of a Philosopher, 1997, remarked on the lack of ideals, values and theory in British politics. One supposes that this might be inevitable, even when ideals are built in e.g. in the beginning of an era in political system, the ascent to power selects those who seek it rather than those value ideals. At the same time this tendency is necessarily balanced by opposing forces: the need for positive structure, the charisma and action of actual individuals naturally interested in a good life
What system would encourage proper ideals? In principle, democracy as I have defined it below; what kind of institution will encourage the maintenance of such democracy in practice? And, this is not a distinct question, what will be necessary for stability and the ‘right?’
Perhaps, a government of ideas. What does that mean? Practically, institutions would encourage seeking and implementing ideas that valued democracy and the right
The death penalty is an important issue. I want to say something about it and along the way illustrate the place of ‘feeling’ in rational determination of consequences. This topic is at the intersection of ethics, politics and justice [law]
The purpose of this section is based in the significance of the topic and that it may illustrate some general considerations – especially determining behavior and institutions by their consequences [the good?] versus honoring fundamental values [the right]
The calculus of consequences may be difficult – harsh punishment is often justified by claiming its deterrent effect. It is claimed that harshness of law has led to diminished crime in Texas c. 2000. Yet crime in America and Texas in particular is much higher than in other parts of the industrialized world where the consequences of crime are milder
In a related issue, the following argument has been given. In surveys, prisoners have claimed that punishment was not a deterrent; this is said to imply that punishment is not an effective deterrent. However, the question is not whether punishment deterred those who acted out – obviously it did not – but whether it deterred those who did not… and how this may be computed
The foundation of the right is not in consequences. But its determination is still difficult
If e.g. killing is wrong, what may be done by someone who believes that in the face of war and the death penalty? That person cannot kill to defend his belief but can he do anything? Yes, of course but how does he or she know, for example, that civil disobedience is right?
When I was young I was against the death penalty; my position was based in emotion and feeling and had no calculus. Rather, there was no formal and identifiable calculus; this does not mean that there was no implicit calculus. Later, in informal discussion I did not argue that the death penalty was wrong or that it was or was not effective; my position was simply that I felt it to be wrong or cruel or harsh; it offended my care. Then, after coming into contact with perpetrators [as a staff member in an acute care psychiatric hospital] and in consideration of the nature and statistics of incarceration my position became reversed; while I had no sympathy with the penalty, I accepted its necessity and I had no sympathy with certain perpetrators. At the same time, it was sympathy that allowed for death over lifetime incarceration. Of course, the death penalty has been applied wrongfully but this has nothing to do with the rightness of the penalty; all kinds of punishment, all kinds of lenience, of mercy, of success have been wrongful or undeserved. Then comes another reversal. In the psychiatric hospital, I found that respect is important. I make no claim that I am a paragon of respectfulness; often, I faltered. But, I did find that the way out of disrespectful antagonism was to search within my ‘soul’ and find respect. It was claimed that if you made a mistaken use of your power, there was no backing out. There is, it is to admit and to care and to go from there. This is an actual and empirical point and not merely theoretical. Respect of the person and of their rights feels right, is most therapeutic among the alternatives of its kind, leads to the most positive and most safe environment. Being partakes of all being. I did not feel right to disrespect even a child molester regardless of his or her true desert. Respect makes the best world. This is the Christian principle yet Christians seem to forget it every moment. Finally, I arrived at the idea: all deserve love and respect. Not that I follow this virtue with full faith; I have difficulty with that in some personal relations; but, even in those relations I feel a need to aspire to overcoming. This cannot be carried to ridiculous consequences. Consequence of action, even though one is not absolute in one’s judgment, is sometimes the best respect. [Some] Individuals with a lifetime of evading the law finally give up because in their heart they have come to know they are ‘wrong.’ The ability to manipulate and evade remains; the heart is no longer there… I came to the place where respect [and care which is love] required that I no longer agree with the death penalty. But is not ‘life’ also an intolerable punishment? Incarceration must be minimized; I have not calculated but I believe this will make a better world. I stated my sentiment but cannot insist. How do we deal with this uncertainty? Perhaps the offender can be given a choice between ‘life’ and death. In the end I leave the decision up to the democratic principle but I know where I stand. My question: what may I do for my stand? But, there are so many injustices… I could die or suffer against them or I could do that a little; and I could live against them and for the right and the good…
Before mentioning political ideologies and systems, I want to restate an assertion. Reading about anarchism, I found talk of how and when to make a transition to an anarchic arrangement of political action. However, it should be recognized that regardless of designation, every political arrangement must contain organized and anarchic elements. The assertion is that actual politics is always pluralistic and is not equal to what is designated. Of course, it is obvious that there are different actualities and that designation does have descriptive power
Systems and change: anarchism, conservatism, constitutionalism, democracy, federalism, feminism, fundamentalism, idealism, incrementalism, liberalism, Marxism, monarchism, nationalism, realism, republicanism, revolutionism, socialism, syndicalism, totalitarianism, utopianism, welfare state
I have not included all classical forms e.g. oligarchy which falls under republicanism and aristocracy which is a variant of monarchism
I have not included fine or even gross distinctions or systems of classification: I may take these up later; clearly there is potential for much further development. As noted above, the principle of inclusion here is what is relevant to the broad canvas of the Journey and what is applicable to its special practical concerns. I may return to the canvas later as the inspiration and opportunity occur. Practical issues will be taken up as the occasion arises
Aristocracy Form of group decision and rule [‘government’] in which the group conflates to an elite; or, government or state having this form. The ‘definition’ is conceptually but not materially biased toward ‘democracy’ and the bias is not material for the system of action in concern in ‘politics’ is, in concept, the group; Greek: arisokrátia, aristo[s] – best, noblest; -cracy = combining form meaning ‘rule,’ Greek: -kratia = rule, might
Autocracy Form… in which the group conflates to a single person who has unlimited power. Greek: autokrátia, autokráteia; auto: combining form meaning self, same, spontaneous
Democracy Popular rule. Form… in which there is no conflation of power; supreme power is with and vested in the people [or, in a practically efficient but potentially malignant form, vested in the freely agreed upon agents of the people; where ‘election’ is a practically efficient but potentially malignant form of ‘agreement.’] Greek: dēmokrátia
Here is a more ideal concept of democracy… Democracy obtains when all people contribute to and receive equally from communal decisions, actions and resources. The ideal statement is naïve in some ways and requires amendment. First, some cannot contribute significantly; and, some may not want or require as much in return… and flexibility is good. Therefore, in principle, a government if distinguished from the total process cannot [logically] be democratic or undemocratic even though the label ‘democratic’ may be figuratively and sometimes appropriately applied to a government. However a government, ‘democratic’ or otherwise may facilitate or block democracy
The function of a listing of ‘forms’ of government as a theoretical exercise in categorizing here primarily to give examples for study of the nature of rule and then to show some variables in its form
Monarchy Form… in which the group conflates to one person, the monarch e.g. a king or emperor or president or autocrat, who has supreme power. Monarch: 1. sole and absolute ruler of a state or nation, 2. hereditary sovereign e.g. king, queen, or emperor. -arch: combining form meaning chief, leader, ruler… -archy: combining form meaning rule, government… Greek: monárchēs = sole ruler, -arches: combining form meaning ruler
Oligarchy Form of… in which the group conflates to a few persons e.g. a dominant class such as an elite, a military ‘junta,’ the wealthy, the merchant class, the priests… Greek: oligarchia, olig(o) = a combining form meaning few, little; e.g. oligopoly = a market [prices and other market factors] controlled by a few sellers, oligpsony = a market controlled by a few buyers who thereby control or greatly influence prices and other market factors; Spanish: junta = meeting
Plutocracy Form of… in which the group conflates to the wealthy; Greek: ploutokrátia, ploutos = wealth
Nature of ‘rule’ and what it is i.e. the concept of ‘rule’
Rule: locus [who] and manner [how;] and how the ruler[s] is [are] determined
Incorporate Variation and Selection into History
History is significant to ‘Journey in Being’ in a number of ways: first, as a part of the Journey; then in understanding sources of influence as the interaction of ideas, action and being…
The second way is relevant here
History has been considered in the following locations in this document: Remarks on the History of Philosophy | History of Ideas | Economics, History, Law? under Political Philosophy and Theory | History | History | The Study of Influence is History
Civilization refers to the large scale movement of societies and cultures under the influence of coordinating and defining ideas whether implicit or explicit and the subject of aspiration
Society refers to the large groups of individuals and small units in, at least loosely, coordinated living; culture is communal knowledge whether formal or implicit
In the current version, ‘Applications and Plans’ are part of ‘Theatres and Platforms of Influence’
Task. ‘Results’ has been added; this is tentative; consider what to include / exclude in the title of this section
2. MATHEMATICS AND ITS FOUNDATIONS
‘The Foundations of Mathematics’ a possible essay; but prefer combining Logic, with Knowledge, Mathematics, the theory of the void which intrinsically includes foundations
3. WORDS / BEING AND METAPHYSICS: A LEXICON
General | 1.27.04: Streamline and bring into correspondence with Journey in Being and its phases; and correspondence with the un/realized uni-verse
General | 1.27.04: A Multilanguage Dictionary for Words, Stems and Origins… for Journey in Being, philosophy, and metaphysics
Either: added to Words or taken from it and streamlined
Topics: those of Journey in Being, especially General Metaphysics and Theory of Being; this list to be added to after making the new outline of Journey in Being
A basic set of words for Journey in Being and, generally, for Metaphysics [philosophy] i.e. understanding the world
Languages: English, French, German, Greek, Latin, Sanskrit
Note on 2.7.04: Begun! See BEING AND METAPHYSICS: A LEXICON
Streamline and integrate Words with Journey in Being | Metaphysics
4. DESIGN FOR A JOURNEY IN BEING
No modifications at present
5. HISTORY OF WESTERN PHILOSOPHY
Add | 9.3.03: studies of the philosophers and philosophies listed in Design for a Journey in Being – see relevant point under the topic design for a journey in being above, in this document. Do this when I return to the knowledge phase of Journey in Being
On the Education of a Philosopher §6.5 ¶2 | 1.26.04: In addition to the effect upon the disaffection between science and philosophy [and other disciplines] the lack in education that is due to too early and too much specialization, there is also a large effect upon the paucity of philosophical thought from the time of Kant and especially today. Specialization is largely due to the parochial, ego-serving and group thinking of specialists. I would argue that delaying specialization in no way retards the education of the specialist for it is a mistake to assume that special skills are taught in the classroom and to ignore “on the job learning” or apprenticeship. The modern ego is disaffected with the idea of apprenticeship, “I am a professional,” thinks the recent graduate; however, the early years of employment in many occupations amount to apprenticeship. A good combination of real general learning and specialist training is excellent for specialists, scientists and philosophers alike. And, conversely, within general learning, an excellent exposure and experience is obtained by general exposure with depth experience, i.e. not just exposure but reading and research, in select topics
ON FUTURE DEVELOPMENT OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY
Indian and Native Philosophy; Synthesis with Western Philosophy | 3.2.04
Plan for a History of Philosophy
Plan for the Other Philosophies: Possibilities
Synthesis with Metaphysics | 3.2.04
Synthesis with History and History of Ideas | 3.2.04
Remarks on the History of Philosophy | 11.28.03
There can be no History of Philosophy without some Conception of Philosophy
‘What is Philosophy’ is an Historical and a Philosophical Question
Evolution of Approaches and Issues in Philosophy
Perspectives in the History of Philosophy
As noted in the section The Restriction to Western Philosophy in History of Western Philosophy, I would like to incorporate other philosophies and their interaction and potential interaction with Western Philosophy. I may do this if time permits and it is then a priority after I feel Journey in Being is ‘complete enough’
It is important that I make some vague restriction to what is significant and general and that I look for synthesis under a unifying principle such as the Theory of Being; one objective is general synthesis. However, I will look out for the significant exception: particular and local developments are important
As noted immediately above, it is important that I make some vague restriction to what is significant and general and that I look for synthesis under a unifying principle such…
Primary emphasis will be Indian and native philosophies. I will also be interested in ‘forgotten’ and secondary trends in Western Philosophy. Other philosophies of potential interest will be African Philosophy, Chinese and other Oriental philosophies
I am not particularly interested with some synthesis with Theory of Being and Systematic Metaphysics. I mention this because the idea suggests itself; however, the aim here is historical but not so in the metaphysics; this point is not absolute and some developments here may be of interest in the metaphysics; additionally, the metaphysics will provide some guide to the synthesis of the different traditions
§1 | 1.26.04: Replace or supplement §1 The Main Periods and Influences by History
History emphasizes the role of ideas and thought in history. One interpretation of history, somewhat Hegelian in nature but one that does not culminate with this culture, would be in terms of the Theory of Being including the equivalence with the Void and Eternal Return: these theories provide [1] a foundation, [2] an absolute concept of the absolute, [3] notions of quasi-determinism and quasi-causation within indeterminism and a-causality –at least in the temporal mode of thought– and notions of universal determinism from super-temporal view… where neither the temporal nor the super-temporal view is higher in any final sense and each requires the other in metaphysical and psychological terms
Philosophers themselves must have some implicit conception to recognize the subject; the implicit characterization is not the same as the stated
The definition of philosophy is a process of struggle – witness the labor of Wittgenstein who was laboring to define a phase that he mistook for the whole: Wittgenstein had a personality
The writer of a History of Philosophy must also have a concept of philosophy in order to select and interpret; else the writer would merely repeat everything written in its original language… without interpretation History of Philosophy would be reduced to publication of a random anthology; lack of actual randomness would be a result of implicit conception
However, the interpretation need not be ‘monistic;’ the history may be written from multiple vantage points
In the West, the recognized tradition begins with Thales and the Pre-Socratics; there are two aspects: the explicit attempt to understand [sub-stance] the world when Thales said ‘All is Water’ which is simultaneously profound and naïve and at once emanating from the self-consciousness of that thought the possibility and establishment of a Pre-Socratic tradition of criticism
This shows in embryo form how in order to understand the philosophy of an era it is useful, perhaps necessary, to understand the reason and occasion for the concerns and the basis, not deterministic, in context and what came before…
Therefore, in a sense, History of Philosophy may be conceived as starting here, today and stretching back in time and outward in being… and then it can be written in the conventional way. This was already done by Hegel if erroneously in other ways but was not, no doubt, his original brilliant stroke for how could this idea not have been conceived before? Does not every individual see the world spreading out before her or him?
The approach in philosophy is this: imagination and criticism… imagination and concept formation i.e. an image of pattern and not merely discrete and atomic fact… and then the various modes of criticism – logical or pertaining to the system of description and making description more than mere description; and empirical and making reference more than ‘mere’
Freedom of imagination enables the question of the fundamental question, ‘What is the Real Nature of Things?’ And every other question ‘Why is there something…’ is contained in that original question
[The profusion of imagination is such that not everything may ever be criticized!]
From the beginning knowledge and being are bound together even though often considered separately as in the idealism of Plato and in Aristotle’s Metaphysics… However, Plato considered that knowledge is power [has effect] and that being is that which has effect…
The story passes through Descartes systematic doubt; Locke’s distinction of primary and supposedly objective qualities and secondary and subjective qualities; science; Hume’s critique of inductive reason and the categories of understanding i.e. Hume’s brilliant categorial error; and finally to Kant who inverts, actually and apocryphally, the entire system to that time: the categories of understanding are those brought to the world by the mind and are not at all the world-as-it-is…
And this leads to the critiques of the subject/object [phenomenon/noumenon?] split as a paradigm based in something as simple as the metaphor of vision as a paradigm… and to ‘re-integration.’ And leads, in turn, to revaluation and placement of Kant’s transcendental idealism: briefly, the world generates the individual in the world whose adapted or whole relation is the intuition [subject to the individual’s context]. The Kantian system which integrates prior systems, is itself based on an aspect: singling out knowing from a larger picture, thus fracturing perhaps the phenomenon from the world… which fracture is itself a phenomenon or ‘picture…’ to the conclusion that although the phenomena are not the world they are in it and not merely part of a representation: the phenomena may have a re-interpretation as part of the real even in terms of reference
Within which story there is a detailed evolutionary story complete with branches, terminations, specializations e.g. analytic and linguistic philosophy that sometime parade as the whole, semi-global forward movement
Somewhat unlike science, philosophy does not have the luxury of disengaging from its history. The great egoists in philosophy made this mistake including Wittgenstein, despite his brilliance
Chance and culture are significant in History of Philosophy: Rediscovery of Aristotle; philosophy becomes natural philosophy and ‘philosophy proper’ which then interact as in river-tributary and distributary-delta; if Aristotle had [also] been rediscovered in India he may [also] have been in the Indian tradition; yet today we seek not also to universalize but to localize which is good but also to merely and radically localize which to has its place but which also has destructive elements
E.g. empiricism and idealism, two great traditions of knowledge in the west, both begin with experience but different phases of it and therefore under different paradigms that are parts of the whole and therefore result in a useless bifurcation that, paradoxically but not paradoxically, result in fruitful sophistry… Kant and Schopenhauer saw and went beyond the paradigm split of empiricism and idealism but retained the split between the subject and the necessity of its being a part of the world i.e. its adaptation
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