the way of being

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Preliminary

In setting up a system of concepts for a metaphysics for realization the following are needed (i) as knowledge and value are in the world, they are essential metaphysical concepts (ii) the concepts of a concept and of concept definition are to be specified (iii) a cohesive systematic system of concepts to cover the notion of being in the world (‘existence’), the entire world (‘universe’), nothingness (‘the void’), beings (‘contents of the world’), beings with a sense of significance (experience, experiential being), hierarchy of being (from primitive, to ordinary experiential, to peak), and dimensions of being (aspects of being that correspond to areas of action in the world).

In this preliminary section, we focus item #ii above—concepts and definitions and what makes them real (have objects) and effective in understanding.

Here, concept shall mean a concept (what we think of as a mental content) in referential form, i.e., the form of reference to something (an object) in the world. DEFINITION, then, is specification of a concept.

In metaphysics, a definition does not guarantee the existence of an object in the world. This is contrary to the situation in mathematics, where provided the definitions (and axioms) have no intrinsic contradiction, existence if often presumed. In metaphysics, here, the primary concepts (being, beings, and so on), are intended as abstract in the sense that distortion is filtered out (and not in the sense that the objects are not concrete). The structure of these primary objects is such that inference to an ideal metaphysics (below) is immanent in the objects. The ideal system is perfect in capturing a framework representation of the universe that is ultimate in the capture and in what it reveals (the universe as the realization of the greatest possibility).

Aware readers will note affinity of these thoughts with Wittgenstein’s Tractatus—however, there is no appeal here to some ultimately low-level atomic facts; rather, the primitive facts at a high level and get their precision and perfection from abstraction.

As explained later, the framework of the ideal metaphysics is filled in with pragmatic detail so as to form a detailed description, which is perfect in a different but justified sense. Thus, method is inherent in the system. In anticipation of use of the term metaphysics, we conceive it as study of the real (in a way that science is not, for physics, for example, postulates fundamental entities including laws that, even though many valid predictions follow, are not known to be real).

There is also affinity with Heidegger on being, but without the depth and all the problematicity that Heidegger assigns to being. There is depth but here it is within being. There are problems such as the apparent contradictoriness of the existence of the void. However, this is no more than just apparent because the meaning of the term ‘existence’ is different for the void than it is for manifest objects. This defuses the apparent contradiction; and as far as I know this is a difference that Heidegger did not remark. Of course, there are problems of our existential nature that Heidegger addresses, which are significant, but their importance is diminished here because of the larger view of the universe that will emerge.

Beings and being, knowledge, value

experience – awareness in all its forms down to the primitive (the latter is explained and shown later), feeling, perception, concept (referential form – related to intentionality, referential concept) thought, self-knowledge, agency; has two sides in relation ‘experience-of’ or mindlike – experience or experiential relation – ‘the experienced’ (the latter may be empty and is matterlike though objectlike would be a better descriptor).

object – real or as if referent of a concept; included for completeness.

knowledge – that which marks a valid and real object of a concept; validity – correspondence, pragmatism, reason as establishment of fact and inference, abstraction; metaphysics is study of the real and includes all philosophy that is study of the world (and therefore of knowledge, value, and general logic), which is different from science (and art) only in emphasis.

value – of significance, e.g., ethical, aesthetic, and having meaning in the sense of meaning of life; an aspect of knowledge.

a being (plural: beings) – that which is or can be known; the realization of a concept; an existent; a real object of the verb to be in its most inclusive sense; real object.

being – the characteristic of and only of beings as beings; existence; knowledge and being are interwoven, for talk of a being that is not known specifies nothing and as will be seen later, the being that cannot be known is effectively nonexistent.

dimensions of being – aspects of being that are useful in describing being at a level of detail greater than that of being-as-being; related to what are called categories in philosophy (starting with Aristotle).

Discussion: being

Being has been regarded as trivial, as superficial, as deep, as ineffable (not describable in terms of language); but with abstraction, there is being, it is superficial and trivial yet will be found powerful and to contain depth.

Some beings and characteristics of being

experiential – aware beings in all forms of awareness.

experiential hierarchy – from primitive to peak with human being somewhere on the continuum, the primitive being matter or mere objectlike, the highest being god and the gods as explained later.

real – that which can be known or enter awareness, for the hypothetical being that cannot be known is effectively—later truly—nonexistent.

cosmos – a local realm accessible to experiential beings in mutual communication.

universe – all being or beings, includes all cosmoses including those not currently in interaction with ours – either beyond or passing through).

law, i.e., natural law – pattern or constraint, usually thought to pervade a cosmos.

the void – absence of being; there are no beings in the void and as laws are beings the void has no laws.

Possible, impossible, and necessary beings

possibility – given a referential concept, realization is said to be possible if it does not violate conditions of realism; in impossibility, realism would be is violated.

coherent possibility – nothing in the concept itself precludes realization; also called logical possibility.

real possibility – nothing in the nature of the universe precludes realization; presumes coherent possibility; therefore, the real possibility presumes the coherent; and the coherent possibility is the greatest or most inclusive possibility; real possibility is realizability in some possible world.

natural possibility – nothing in natural law precludes realization; natural possibility is a case of real possibility (given imperfection in natural law, natural law approximates some case of real possibility).

possible being – a being whose realization is not precluded by its concept or the nature of the universe; thus, there are coherently, really, and naturally possible beings; if realization is precluded, the being is impossible.

necessary being – one whose concept is such that its existence must obtain; it is contingently necessary if the necessity follows from some fact or law; otherwise, it is logically or absolutely necessary.

Limitlessness

fundamental principle of metaphysics – the void exists; proof – existence and nonexistence of the void are equivalent (this is not a contradiction for the meaning of ‘to exist’ changes in the case of the void, which is the nonmanifest being); perfection follows from abstraction.

doubt – whereas the universe and (manifest) beings are real from their definition, existence of the void is subject to doubt; however, existence and nonexistence of the void are equivalent and therefore the void may be taken to exist; this seems like a contradiction but is not because for most objects, existence is manifest existence but for the void, it is in the nature of the concept that nonmanifest existence is existence; this is the key point at which doubt arises and it follows from the ontological nature of the proof and is later amplified by the magnitude of the consequences; however, the fundamental principle is not inconsistence with experience and valid knowledge.

ideal metaphysics – system of direct consequences of the fundamental principle; its generative principle is, especially, imagination, however mechanical generation of possibility is also included; its critical principle is deductive logic or certain inference; our deductive logics are generative but must be considered incomplete (i) because not all forms of expression are included (yet) (ii) they do not (yet) include non-linguistic forms of expression; logical and real possibility are identical and (far) exceed natural possibility and cosmological possibility (for ours or any given cosmos and its laws).

real metaphysics – the ideal metaphysics to which is joined valid pragmatic knowledge; imperfect by correspondence criteria, it is perfect in terms of the value of ultimate realization in and from our world, for it is the best available instrument and guaranteed success; doubt is addressed by regarding the fundamental principle and consequences as (i) a postulate (ii) an existential hypothesis (iii) a pragmatic approach to discovery; referred to as ‘the metaphysics’.

cosmology – study of the variety, extension, duration, peak, and cyclicity (or otherwise) of beings; includes principles of study, i.e., the ideal and the real metaphysics.

general cosmology – cosmology based on the ideal metaphysics, i.e., with reference to only the most general principles, i.e., logic.

cosmology of form and formation – general cosmology enhanced by the real metaphysics (paradigmatic principles derived from the laws and theories of the abstract and concrete sciences); concepts for the cosmology of form – sameness, difference, identity, extension, relation, and duration; and space-time-matter; from the possibilities of sameness and difference, extension and duration or space and time are complete with regard to marking different objects; properties are markers of difference not associated with space and time.

experiential cosmology and the cosmology of realization of peak beings and ultimate being, i.e., of god and gods; begins with analysis of experience—(i) earlier it was suggested that being is experiential being – this may be shown in outline as follows (ii) if the universe were of a substance, the substance would be experience; however, from the metaphysics the universe cannot be a substance world, yet experience is essential in it and must reach down to the root in primitive form. Experiential cosmology continues with analysis of the varieties of experience and experiential being (iii) the universe is neither material, nor ideal, nor god, but there must be matter like, idea like, and god phases; the culmination of the cosmology is the realization of peak and ultimate beings, i.e., gods and ‘god’; there are remote gods of lesser significance, but we are part of and become the ultimate.

physical cosmology – cosmology for our cosmos based on theoretical and experimental physics and astronomy.

abstract objects – are abstractions from this world; are real; like ‘everything’, are in this world, not in another; are in space and time but have some degree up to the entirety of space and time filtered out in the abstraction; concrete objects are not ‘concrete’ but also abstract and the distinction is relative to knowers; abstract and concrete objects are equally real; with sufficient abstraction a degree of perfection is possible that is not generally attainable for the concrete; abstract objects may be approached axiomatically but so can the concrete as seen regarding being at high levels (meaning low levels of detail); in science, it is preferred to use some combination of the axiomatic and the empirical.

Dimensions of being

pure dimension – experiential being in form and formation of worlds and beings on the way to the transparently limitless ultimate; logic; secondary pure dimensions are mindlike and matterlike, and extension-real object-duration, pattern, or law (but not particular patterns or laws).

pragmatic dimensions – aspects of the universe derived from patterns in our world, whose generalization to the universe (i) seems reasonable (ii) is guaranteed by the metaphysics (iii) is instrumental in understanding; logic in its most inclusive sense; near symmetry and stable form and dynamics; mechanism with indeterminism (from physics); incremental variation and selection from life science; creation and criticism as aspects of mind (which are related to variation and selection in biology); select paradigms from knowledge of society, which are tentative and for which see the little manual.

Realization

pathways – negotiated paths and lifeways in and from the world to the ultimate – from human to peak being; employs the real metaphysics and cosmology, ideal and pragmatic, and the two sides of experience (above); (human) being – is experiential and discrete over limited time but ultimate (peaks or gods and god, all-possible-being-as-one) over extended time or above time; pathways in the world give attention to the pure and pragmatic dimensions of being.

pleasure and pain – pleasure is not to be sought solely for itself but especially as being on a path; pain cannot be avoided; the enlightened path seeks intelligent and shared negotiation (not just following), and (i) gives pleasure without an excess of pleasure seeking for the sake of pleasure (ii) may result in local image of the ultimate in the person (but is not the ultimate in itself) (iii) while realization is given, the enlightened path is efficient in realization of the ultimate as we cross from life to life, from form to form, amid the myriad of cosmoses, while dwelling in nothingness in between (iv) the issues of pleasure and pain are addressed by sharing, by therapy, by the able giving aid to the less able, by attention without obsession to healthy living (physical, mental, communal, and spiritual) (v) and above all that local enlightenment which seeks process through and not around pain.

Thus, enlightenment (contentment, mutual salvation rather than external salvation) – pertains to being in this world for the ultimate is not in need of enlightenment; in received religion, enlightenment is often thought to be a kind of ideal perfection; however, the real perfection or enlightenment as emerged here is good (if not best) enjoyment – with commitment – of being on a real path with acceptance of pleasure and pain toward and retreat from the ultimate.