The Way of Being
An extended outline for The Way of Being
Anil Mitra, Copyright © (this document) – February 2024 – February 17, 2025
Anil Mitra, Copyright © (the way of being and precursors) September 1986 – February 17, 2025

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Contents
The study topics include topics, persons, sources, and ‘to do’ items.

Part I About this document

About the outline

Plan for the outline and the main document

About the structure of this, the final version of The Way of Being

Parallel action plan with ongoing simplification

Source documents for the outline

Part II The Way of Being

Into The Way

Introduction to The Way of Being

Origins, sources, motives, and reasons

Overview of the way – essential content and structure

Features

How to read the way

Living the way – shared pathways

To step into the world

Past, present, and future as one

Part III Parallel developments

The Way of Being

Part I About this document

The work is an in-process outline, plan, and beginning for the ‘last’ version of the way of being. It will be updated frequently.

About the outline

The outline flows from a system of concepts and their relationships.

The outline will be the basis of a short essay and a long essay, using the structure described in the next section. These will be the two final essays and basis for a minimal site for the way of being.

Plan for the outline and the main document

As they speak of the ultimate, the works cannot be complete. Further, every culture necessarily recreates truth.

So, residual plans will be absorbed into a section on resources.

About the structure of this, the final version of The Way of Being

The version has (i) a minimal center – out, top – down core with essentials (ii) a main part with foci on realization and concepts, also realized in a table of content, with explanation, sources, and relevant historical material (iii) a part on parallel developments, i.e., implications for endeavor and ideas (iv) a reference part.

Parallel action plan with ongoing simplification

See design and planning.docm.

Source documents for the outline

See design and planning.docm.

Part II The Way of Being

The Way of Being is abbreviated The Way or the way.

Into The Way

Comment 1. Prologue

Comment 2. The way and its aim—

“Into The Way” is an informal introduction, overview, and guide to the way; the significance of ‘into’ is not departure from the world but temporary retreat so as to return with a fresh attitude, inspiration, and greater power.

Comment 3. … and preface

Introduction to The Way of Being

This section tells you about the aim of the way and what kind of work it is.

The Way of Being is shared discovery and realization of the ultimate, in, for, and from the immediate world. This is the aim of the way and it requires knowledge and action in interaction.

The way is a system of knowledge of the universe based in experience and reason, its implications for living in our world and the universe, acting on the implications, and improving the system of knowledge.

It is not a synthesis of received thought. It is grounded in but goes beyond received thought – beyond received worldviews. Sharing and contribution are among its aims.

It is not merely a developed system of knowledge. It is a system but it is in process – a foundation, a system, experience, and action… all in interaction with one another… and in historical interaction with the world of ideas and action. It is thus a non-dogmatic and evolving document.

It derives and used an ultimate and well-founded worldview—of the universe as limitless, which exceeds the ultimate of most worldviews.

Shows that the immediate—our world—and the ultimate are one – that they are mutually enhancing.

Origins, sources, motives, and reasons

Seeking, experience, action, learning

Comment 4. Seeking vs search.

Personality – accepting vs seeking; degree of basis in the received and in authority

History of ideas, world paradigms, and endeavor

Major world paradigms and their individual and mutual inadequacies.

Secular and transsecular

On conflict between secular and transsecular views

Myth, dogma, and beyond

Sources

Criticism, imagination, and sharing

Paradox

Comment 5. Shall this section be maintained? Why is paradox critical?

Contribution to the human endeavor and destiny

Overview of the way – essential content and structure

Purpose

Present a compact self-contained picture of TWB—ideas, method, integration with endeavor.

Address problems of dogma, limited familiarity with the new paradigm, meanings of terms, and the issue of gestalt and holism.

Revelation of the content with embedded outline.

Brief summary of the way

The main argument

That a possible being would not emerge from the void would be a constraint; however the void is and has nothing, not even constraint.

Implications for knowledge

Therefore, the universe has identity; the universe and every-being-over-all-time are identical—the realization of greatest possibility.

The universe is eternal—it is limitless in extension and duration, phases between peak and dissolution. Its cause is necessity and cannot be another being for there is no other. It is far greater than the empirical cosmos—there are limitlessly many cosmoses of limitless variety, of which limitlessly many are passing through ours with minimal interaction; there is a hierarchy of experiential being from nil to peak-being-which-is-and-knows-all—and in our present state we are at a low rung on that hierarchy.

Implications for realization

There are effective and enlightened paths to ultimate realization. They begin in and enhance our world.

An enlightened pathway or lifeway employs the two sides of experiential being (i) subjective – reason and emotion in balance, critical reflection including doubt, and meditation (ii) objective – attention to the physical, living, economic, political, legal, technological, informational, and cultural environment in the motion of being(s) toward the ultimate in this life and beyond. A healthy life attends to physical, mental, communal, and spiritual aspects of life; pain and doubt via these aspects, via therapy, via the more fortunate help the less, and by maintaining a balance of emotion and reason and of pain and pleasure in being on a path.

An enlightened attitude encourages doubt, addressed further in the main text. Here, it is relevant that doubt leads to one of three acceptable ends – rejection, acceptance, and doubt in balance with and contributing to enlightened action.

The way of being and its aim

The Way of Being (abbr. the way) is shared discovery and realization of the ultimate in, for, and from our world.

Why being?

To appeal to being – the concept – as existence is to take the world as it is rather than to prejudice discovery by appeal to or denial of substance (e.g., matter or mind), relationship, process, trope, spirit, or other kinds (so it is implied that the ultimate is under discovery rather than given). Then, to conceive the universe as all being does not distinguish spirit from matter or assert or deny the nature and existence of these kinds (and so, whether a god created the universe is falsely regarded as fundamental). The void is the absence of being—though it is a being it harbors no beings. Laws, i.e., natural laws, are patterns that are immanent in the world (or the universe or parts of it such as a cosmos or cosmoses, and, thus, laws are beings. The void has no laws.

The main argument

As the void has no laws, all possibility emerges (possibilities emerge) from it—of absolute necessity.

Implications: metaphysics

Necessity as cause (of the universe)

It is of necessity that there is no eternal nothingness. The manifest universe may be seen as emerging from the void, from any being, or from itself—it is not created except if necessity is seen as creative force.

Universe as realization of all possibility

The universe is the realization of all possibility; it is experiential and has identity, which phase eternally between nothingness, the manifest, and peak states of being (note: experience is awareness in all its varieties).

Is this contradictory? No, for (i) there is no self-contradiction for possibility is an inherently consistent concept, that is—there is no internal or logical contradiction (ii) there is no contradiction of observation or science, for the possibilities that we do not see or that may seem to contradict science, occur outside the boundary of observation—in other words, there is no external, scientific, observational, or empirical contradiction.

The universe and its identity are limitless in duration and extension; in variety, peak, and dissolution (it phases eternally between the void and the manifest).

There are cosmoses of limitless number and variety, whose isolation is at most temporary, and which must be connected at the edge of their boundaries (in extension-duration)—but not only at the edges – there are and at any of their times, there must be effectively no-interaction or negligible-interaction cosmoses passing through one another, especially through ours (thus the connection is everywhere).

Experiential being and hierarchy

The concept of experience

Experience is awareness in all its kinds and forms. The concept of experience includes consciousness and agency, awareness in its feeling and cognitive modes, its levels from sense to thought, and its receptive and active or agentive aspects (this conception of experience is more inclusive than in common received use; we prefer the term experience to consciousness because the latter is less inclusive; agency is ability to conceive and act toward outcomes and includes will and perhaps freedom of will).

Experience is the crux of (our) being

Without experience we are (effectively) nonexistent—experience is the crux of our being.

To understand experience enables initial characterization of our nature our development of understanding the universe, which is all being.

The form of experience

The form of experience is experience of in experiential relation to the experienced (in ‘pure experience’, the experienced is absent though potential, and the ‘of’ may be dropped from ‘experience of’).

‘Experience of’ is the concept or subject or as-if of mind; ‘the experienced’ is the object or as-if material, i.e., as-if of matter).

Experiential beings in an experiential universe

We are experiential beings in an experiential universe.

We are beings in an experiential hierarchy—neither the zero of sentients, nor the merest, nor the peak, but phasing between the ends of the sentient continuum; we – all beings – inherit the limitlessness of the universe, which is not a contradiction as beings merge as one in the peaks of the universe.

That we will realize peak and dissolution eternally is given; however, there are (intelligent) pathways to the ultimate, which, to be effective, should be shared and negotiated rather than merely followed (traditions may be useful in charting paths); ultimate god is not remote, it is in process – a process in which all beings take part.

About the concept of an object

Above, object is not restricted to ‘thing’ but includes relation, process… whatever can be the object of experience including experience itself; nor is object restricted to the physical—it includes natural, living, and social entities, e.g., the political and the economic, and as-if mind and as-if spirit as the object of perception or thought.

Knowledge – its nature and criteria for validity

What is knowledge and what are its method criteria of validity? It is efficient to begin with experience as a medium of knowledge, to allow method to emerge, and to evaluate it when it has emerged. The following emphasizes ‘knowledge that’, i.e., fact, over ‘know how’; however, it has been argued that knowing how is not distinct from knowing that.

Meaning and knowledge

A concept is an experience of an object (‘object’ just means ‘referred to’ and is not restricted to things or kinds and may be empty); thus, here, concepts are referential concepts. Meaning is a concept and its possible objects and linguistic meaning is a sign attached to a concept via habit, use, and, sometimes, by formalization. Knowledge is meaning realized—a concept and its actual (and intended) objects. Now this presumes that concepts depict the real. However, intended depictions may be in error and, further, the depiction model itself may be in error (for there is no ‘picture’ in the brain but what we have is a picture of a picture model).

Perfect representation

With perfect representation as criterion, we cannot validly claim perfection unless it is demonstrated. However, ‘everyday knowledge’ has obvious pragmatic validity. On the other hand, perfection is an ideal that is sometimes desirable to achieve. Here, there will be significant cases in which perfection is achieved by abstraction, which is to filter from the referential concept, all elements that are necessarily distorted.

Later, perfect representation and pragmatically valid knowledge will be joined to form a system of knowledge of the universe—the real metaphysics—which is perfect relative to a revealed ultimate value.

Birth and death are real but not absolute

Birth and death are real but not absolute. In death, we go back into potential being (i.e., minimal being merged with all being or, in the extreme, the nonbeing of the void). In birth, we are (generally) not copies of our previous beings. Why, in general, do we not have this explicit awareness? Explicit pan-awareness of universal existence occurs at higher levels of experiential being – beings that populate cosmoses with perhaps greater forms than ours. Perhaps this is not the most common mode, but from limitlessness it is necessarily one mode of panbeing. Thus, even discounting those who say they perceive past lives, we do have the conceptual power—here and now—to see our panbeing.

Therefore, the ‘why’ question above is really—ought to be—a ‘how’ question and the answer is that while we do not (may not seem to) have perceptual awareness, we are at that place in the hierarchy of experiential being such that (i) we can think the question (ii) answer it conceptually even though or if we do not see it now, in this life, perceptual awareness of it will arise in going back into potential being and emerging again, higher in the experiential hierarchy.

An alternate perspective is not that we are ‘this being’ and will emerge again, higher, but that we are all just one being, constituted of many, discrete beings relative to the time frames of our cosmos, but continuous – one – on sufficiently long time frames or at a level of description above time and change. Now, given this reasoning, we can intuit or sense our oneness of being, but can we perceive it? It may depend on what we regard as our instruments of perceiving. From the point of view of an individual self, the boundary between the body and the environment is the location of instruments of perception; from a universal perspective, that boundary as locating what is to be called perception is arbitrary and internal-internal and internal-external flows of information have the same status; neither perspective is in error, neither is finally basic, but each is more illuminating for some purposes and less illuminating for others. Perhaps, however, it may be possible to be aware of our panbeing in some states of consciousness, e.g., in meditation or cathartic experience (as awareness of a signature of panbeing in our being).

Ideal and real metaphysics

Limitlessness reveals an ideal metaphysics, which is perfectly faithful to the real in virtue of an abstract (character) of being and the void (which are not essentially abstract—the abstract is what remains when what is essentially distortable from the concept is filtered out). It shows an ideal of perfection but needs a complement to develop concrete vision of and paths to the real. The complement may be chosen as our pragmatic knowledge which is not perfectly faithful. The join of the two—the perfectly faithful and the pragmatic—is not perfectly faithful as representation but as the only and necessarily effective guide to the ultimate it is perfect and seamless relative to the ideal value of realizing the ultimate in this world and beyond.

This join, named the real metaphysics, is a seamless join of the ideal metaphysics, justified pragmatic science, value theory, and action.

The real metaphysics entails a worldview at the core of the way (i) of the immediate and the ultimate as one and, in what follows, (ii) with pathways of enlightenment for living with attention to material and ultimate aspects of individuals, societies, and the world.

Real metaphysics, cosmology, and value

The system above thus avoids (false) purism based on separation of knowledge disciplines – metaphysics, epistemology, value theory, and logic – and knowledge and action.

Criticism and response

The real metaphysics could be criticized—it is neither absolutely precise nor scientific (i.e., hypothetico-deductive). In response, let us repeat that it has a precise ideal framework that frames pragmatic detail which includes science and is obviously not absolutely precise. Thus, it is precise where precision is possible, scientific in the realm of science, as perfect as possible in (i) the sense of precision and (ii) relative to the value of ultimate realization. It accepts dual criteria, thus avoiding unnecessary epistemic purism and places precision, reason, and pragmatism in a larger (ultimate) context.

System of knowledge

Talk of the system of knowledge brings up issues of the disciplines of knowledge and their range. I argue that all knowledge is metaphysics as knowledge of the world—as knowledge, value, and reason are in the world, epistemology, value theory, and logic (in its most general sense), are implicit in metaphysics, i.e., philosophical knowledge is part of metaphysics (and similarly metaphilosophy and metametaphysics are part of metaphysics). Metaphysics has two kinds—real (e.g., the abstract metaphysics above) and speculative which is similar to the hypotheticodeductive approach to science—and thus science, too, is implicit in metaphysics (further the real and the speculative have integration as in the real metaphysics). What of the abstract disciplines, e.g., mathematics? Though its current ‘method’ is the axiomatic approach, (i) the real metaphysics shows that all mathematics has realization (ii) mathematics may also be seen as abstraction from the world. An argument similar to this one could be made for philosophy; however, some parts of philosophy would be excised as not all philosophy is (intended as) knowledge.

Method and validity

Let us now discuss method and validity. Method is the how of knowledge and it may now be seen as having two parts—discovery and justification, which build upon each other. Discovery has required us to go through the range of human knowledge, join them together as one, which potentially remains in process. Received justification has many sides but in total is found inadequate. A definite method of justification is not expected in advance of analysis and experience. On the one hand, knowledge as a whole (metaphysics as found in the previous paragraph), is found traditionally wanting while science and emphasis on empirical data are exaggerated with regard to validity and range. We have found a perfect framework of representation of the ultimate, which joined to pragmatic knowledge, is perfect with respect to an ultimate value. While traditional-current on foundation of the pragmatic remains significant, that significance is placed in context of the ultimate. Yet the modern philosophical and scientific (knowledge) community remains confident in its unawareness.

Dimensions of being

This system reveals dimensions of being (abbr. dimensions)—(i) the pure dimension—experiential being in form and formation of worlds and beings on the way to the ultimate and (ii) pragmatic dimensions from our received knowledge—which, since imperfection is allowed in process, may be chosen from the western system: natural (material, living, experiential), social (group, political-economic-value, culture-education-discovery-meaning, i.e., meaning in the sense of significance), and the universal (experiential and object-like aspects of approach to peak being), together with paradigms projected in process to the universe (e.g., non-determinist variation and selection for near equilibrium, mechanism with and without probabilistic change, dynamics of systems and societies).

Individuals and the approach to universal self

At levels of description over long times, perhaps, e.g., far greater than the life of a cosmos, individual selves approach universal self. At a level that is above time, universe and self are identical. On the other hand, in a process view, from nothingness come selves, then universal self, which repeats eternally, beginning with nothingness once again.

Comment 6. Thus, narrative may begin with self-experience or being-universe. In beginning with being and the void, the emphasis is on realization. To emphasize academic metaphysics first, it could begin with either experience or being.

Comment 7. The material on pathways is repeated later in realization > overview, with greater detail on planning.

Comment 8. The material below is paste special to later in this document, and templates and dedication.docm. The material should be edited here and updated where it has been pasted.

Review, the system as a whole

In review, the approach from being enabled freedom from assumption generally and freedom from limiting (even crippling) received approaches grounded in substance metaphysics including general metaphysics, science, and religion; and in purism and the desire to have foundation at the beginning or the middle or the end or in process rather than to let foundation emerge as it may.

Regarding the purposes of the section, we see how the system stands as a whole; that it is in interaction with life and endeavor; that it is self-contained with regard to content, method, in process with action.

Implications: realization

Comment 9. The material shaded yellow below was paste special from outline of the way-new.docm but the link is now broken.

Enlightened ways

The aim of an enlightened, healthy, or effective lifeway or pathway is effective realization of the ultimate, beginning with its best form in this world (i.e., the world of the seeking beings).

That is, there is dual focus on quality of life in our world and the ultimate. The effective path recognizes that experiential human being is discrete over ‘ordinary time’ (e.g., lives) but ultimate – peak being – over long enough times or at a level of description above time; that is, birth and death are real but not absolute—locally but not absolutely real.

In this world the individual experience—perception, thought, feeling, will, and action—is the focus of ends – political, economic, moral and other (positively because it is where all significance lies and negatively by elimination of inanimate / non-feeling objects). Groups and institutions are important, but their importance derives from the significance of individual experience. In the universe at large, experience itself is the focus and generator of all ends (and, thus, ‘inanimate objects’ are included because, when primitive experience is taken into consideration, they are not essentially non-experiential).

A healthy pathway (physical, mental, communal, and spiritual) attends to needs and effective action individual, society, and world, in meditative, material, and immersive aspects of the dimensions on a path to the ultimate. A healthy life emphasizes the needs of the individual and society in this world and on the way to the ultimate.

A balance of emotion, reason, sharing, and action

Enlightenment seeks balance and integration of emotion, reason (fact, inference), and action in interest (service) of self, other, community, world, and approach to peak being.

An enlightened path (i) seeks intelligent and shared negotiation (not just following received ways or masters) (ii) results in a replica – typically incomplete – of the ultimate in the being – body and mind – of the individual in ‘this’ life and rarely in the ultimate itself (iii) but is on the way to the ultimate and 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.

Pleasure and pain

Pleasure and pain (physical pain, doubt, anxiety) are unavoidable. The issues of pleasure and pain are addressed (i) in that pleasure for its own sake need not be avoided, but paths emphasize pleasure in being on the way—on the path (ii) by shared negotiation of pathways (in which leaders may arise but are not seen as absolute in truth) (iii) with therapy – the best therapy of the time (iv) by the able and fortunate giving aid to the less able or fortunate (v) by attention without obsession to healthy living – physical, mental, communal, and spiritual (vi) and above all that local enlightenment which avoids illusions of ideal perfection but seeks a pragmatic balance of emotion (particularly pleasure and pain), reason, and action on shared paths—i.e., as far as reasonable, seeks process through and not around pain.

Effective pathways

Effective pathways address living in the immediate world on the way to the ultimate—they address the everyday and the universal, (and, as elaborated in the document outline of the way-new.docm), dimensions of being (i) at a high level the pure subject and object aspects of experience (ii) in the world, the pragmatic. Particularly included are (a) meditation, calming, analytic, and visionary (including an attempt to visualize and ways to actualize panbeing) (b) yogic or healthy living directed at individual, family, work, and community – local to global and immediate in time to ultimate.

Thus, enlightenment 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 emerged here sees it as a good to best mix of an idealized notion of perfection and the work – even struggle – of being on a path.

About religion

As far as unjustified belief or disbelief are religious, most people who have a position on the truth of dogmatic religion are religious.

The path of the way is open to use of religion though not to its dogmatic insistence. We recognize two approaches in religion—one that emphasizes a relationship with a powerful divine element which may symbolically energize a positive life and another that emphasizes correct thought, speech, and action on the way to realization which may be mundane or universal.

The place of ways from tradition

The mix of (i) the ideal and the struggle vs perfection and (ii) negotiation vs following are two differences between the path described here and common received ways. As the worldview of the present system is ultimate, the paths here frame received pathways. The present system gives preference to those received pathways that see limited being as on the way to the ultimate rather than the ultimate as a remote reward. Still, all systems are recognized for symbolic and community value.

Path programs

The planning focus of an individual-as-individual-as-communal-and-for-discovery-and-realization is a flexible routine selected from options—(i) awaken early – affirmation of being, dedication to realization, meditation on sustaining an attitude of achievement and equilibrium with others through distraction and pain, review priorities and how and when to die; (ii) recognition of ground issues—safety, security, focus on the way, health issues (medications, diet, mental and physical exercise, sleep), and discipline; (iii) morning tasks—medications and treatments, open files to edit, walk – stretch – vitamins – breakfast – fluids, set times and reminders; (iv) developing and foundation for the way—ideas, experience, reflection, study, cowriting and editing, publishing, and presenting; (v) living the way (one’s way)—ideas, attention to self – meditative and physical, immersion in nature and the real, attention to community – social action (political-economic, of laws, technological, and cultural—knowledge development and transmission, tradition, art, religion), attention to spiritual being, relations and networking, acting roles; (vi) pressing and urgent action—being present to the real – emptiness now, security, safety, money, place, and pushing the way; (vii) daily and weekly tasks, lunch, review of plans and planning, preparation and planning for travel and immersion; (viii) exercise—aerobic, stretching, light weights; excursions and photography; (ix) evening rest and review, preparation for the next day, relaxation, social activities, networking; sleep early.

Summary—(i) morning routine and tasks (ii) the way – foundation and transformation, with relationships and sharing (iii) pressing and urgent agenda – emptiness now, security, safety, push twb (iii) tasks and lunch (iv) exercise (v) pm routine (vi) sleep early.

Comment 10. My planning and routine above is a sample—its principle will be integrated with the routine in templates and dedication.

Features

Comment 11. This is to be reviewed, reduced to essentials, and ordered.

Not a review or text in content, intended as an original work that builds on received thought

Doubt has an essential place in the development

Doubt was critically essential in development of the way.

However, its final place is not absolute – is nuanced as discussed in sections on doubt.

Material and existential doubt are present throughout, even when not emphasized or explicit.

Reader doubt is encouraged (i) from respect for truth and limits (ii) as a means of learning.

Doubt ought to be reflexive—i.e., when doubt is taken as casting a shadow on affirmation, that doubt should also be doubted.

Relation to our – human – knowledge

On dogma

Two common human dogmas that color most human paradigms of the universe are (i) the implicit dogma that (our) experience captures the world (ii) that (our) religion captures what is beyond (our) experience.

To those who hold them #i is so obvious as to be unworthy of mention except when called into question and #ii often beyond all doubt.

Overcoming the twin dogmas is overcoming widespread paradigms of the world—difficult not just because of resistance but also because we tend not to see beyond what we see.

Neither science, nor religion but has relations to both

Regarding science, the metaphysics of the way has a framework that is perfect by abstraction; the detailed content has method and content that are like that of science but go beyond the usual range of science.

It is recognized that at any time the detailed content is limited and therefore there is interest in what lies beyond.

It is found possible to talk meaningfully of that beyond but neither completely nor always perfectly; in this there is relation to the significance of religion; however, in this, the way is neither mere speculation nor dogma.

These and related thoughts are basis for improved (real) and re-conceptualizations of logic, science, and religion as a synthetic unity.

The real metaphysics and received knowledge in process

System of knowledge

Comment 12. Discussed elsewhere in ‘features’

Advances holism without rejection of atomism

Kinds of holism to be considered

This is primarily regarding holism of knowledge and meaning. It is not a reference to system holism or to matter as or as not atomistic.

Meaning holism

It emerges that while terms have range of degrees of independence, in any final system of knowledge the terms stand in relation to and may adjust to one another. Pragmatic independence of meaning arises from taking limited knowledge, e.g., received accounts or experiential statuses of the world, as final.

Knowledge holism

While there are relatively independent spheres of knowledge, the independence exists for pragmatic and disciplinary purposes, but not for final and absolute purposes.

Knowledge is seamless.

Over and above accounts of what are philosophy (and what are its subdisciplines), physics, and so on, there needs to be an account of and name for a seamless over-discipline. How shall we approach this? Consider metaphysics regarded as knowledge of all being (the universe). Since knowledge is part of the universe, metaphysics would then be part of its subject. Thus,

1. Metaphysics could function as the over-discipline.

2. As such not only is knowledge seamless, but that seamless entity is knowledge-world.

Holism of method and content

Holism of being

Experience and being are one.

Without experience there is effectively no being.

From the metaphysics of the way it follows that the word ‘effectively’, above, may be omitted.

Development, necessity, sufficiency, and holism (of the concepts as a system)

Comment 13. Import concept development from import.

Comment 14. Should reflect content and method

Comment 15. The holism is shown in overview > the system of concepts, above.

Is neutral to essence

The world is initially seen as just the world

Seemingly trivial, the approach has an ultimate power.

Which leads naturally to an approach from being

Based in neutral being and abstraction rather than prejudiced foundation

Comment 16. E.g., substance, relation, process, property, trope, God… (see the overview)

And gives a limited post metaphysical place to substance and so on

Being is found to be experiential, which is a metaphysical necessity, not a posited essence

Comment 17. … in a sense of ‘experience’ that (i) crosses the range of passive to active (ii) form to intensity (iii) extends to the root and to the peak of being

Not based in metaphysical or epistemological purism or pragmatism but in an ethically grounded join of the pure and the pragmatic

Has basis in a critical conception of meaning—

The conception emphasizes meaning as a concept – possible object relation.

Which clarifies meaning and defuses many confusions based in abortive conceptions of meaning. Among these are—

§ The necessity and sufficiency of the concept.

§ An example – it defuses the (so called) problem of negative existentials.

§ It helps clarify the meaning of meaning.

§ For many concepts there is no definite object but the concept – object relation are in process (this defuses confusions arising from the thought that there is a definite concept – object (and negates Kripke’s theory of meaning as having universality).

§ Shows that meaning is a feature of being and not an ephemeral feature of human mind.

§ Is basis for a proper conception of knowledge.

§ Is not contrary to meaning as emerging with use but is contrary to ground level use as definitive or the only mechanism of emergence.

As far as possible self-contained—

Proper conceptions of meaning and knowledge are crucial (and related)

Comment 18. Though concept and linguistic meaning and knowledge are fully developed later, a preliminary is useful

Concepts and kinds of meaning and knowledge

Criteria for validity and usability

Content – disciplines and seamlessness

Comment 19. Naming seamless content, e.g., ‘metaphysics’ but not an encyclopedic list

Method and content are one

Comment 20. Method is content.

Arguments against method and content as one—a method cannot found itself…

Arguments for—(i) elementary nature of essential method for an ultimate framework which is joined to pragmatic detail and the join perfect in terms of revealed values (ii) knowledge and its use are not static but moving forward in interaction with action and the world.

Therefore, they may be and are developed together

Note (i) at the most general level, method is a compilation of ‘what works’ enhanced by reason but does not thereby become algorithmic (ii) perhaps for peak being knowledge is perfect and would be algorithmic but for the fact that knowledge, too, is peak and no method is needed (iii) for limited being, parts of knowledge may have elements of algorithm (iv) method has two phases, discovery and justification, of which neither is guaranteed to be algorithmic but justification may come closer.

Foundationally closed

Comment 21. Arguments regarding foundationalism.

Source or study topic 1. Fundamentality (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy).

Design of the system and its place in history are part of the system

Self-summarizing via automated tables of contents

Design for dynamic re-organizing according to a range of perspectives – ideas vs use, subject vs object, core material vs general implications

But an evolving work

From objectivism to idealism to being as fundamental

From being as limited to limitless

From spatiotemporal causation to a dual – description above and at the spatiotemporal

From mind and matter to the real as aspects of experience related in experience

Comment 22. Mind and matter are not denied; rather they are allowed an as-if status which is neutral with regard to their real or substance status.

So far the worldview is incomplete, does not begin at a beginning, a center, or an end—but is ever in process

A program of development

Systematic development of concepts

Comment 23. The system is currently in the planning section of the document, which, after use and modification will be imported to this section.

Is a real metaphysics

§ As discussed the metaphysics is real in that the abstract framework is perfect representation (correspondence), its join to pragmatic content is imperfect representation but perfect in terms of revealed value and real / perfect in that sense.

§ Thus, in supplement to the earlier observation that knowledge (method, content), being, and action are one, value may be joined to that oneness.

§ The argument from being to metaphysics is ontological in the sense that the only premise is that there is a world or universe (even if that world is a solipsist world).

Pre and post metaphysical treatment of some topics

Introduction

What this means.

How it is useful to have pre- and post-treatments.

How it is useful to have only post-treatments.

Substance vs being

The universe and all beings as experiential

Being, extension, and duration

There is nothing beyond this

As-if mind – the subjective and as-if matter – the object

There is nothing beyond this

The Way, reason, emotion, and value

The Way of Being attempts – successfully, as is demonstrated – to go beyond the secular without falling into dogma or myth. That is, the way of being develops a reasoned framework for endeavor.

That the framework is reasoned is not to ignore but rather to include feeling, emotion, and value – particularly, ethics and aesthetics.

We are experiential beings in an experiential universe

On dimensions and paradigms of being

Their nature; relation to categories

Their use in theory formation, understanding, and knowledge

I.e., particularly in prediction.

How to read the way

Comment 24. The difficulty of dogma.

On meaning and meanings

System meaning and holism

Reflexivity

Understandings of the pieces and the whole are mutually dependent.

A difficulty: two levels of knowledge

A difficulty: apparent contradictions

External—with experience and science

Internal—the void exists and does not exist

The universe and the meaning of limitlessness

Observations on academic philosophy and metaphysics

The breadth of philosophy and modern research encourage a piecemeal approach, which has strength and weakness

§ The pieces are tractable, but real rigor is a problem when holism is absent.

§ The piecemeal tends to be technical, which may be counter to ‘living philosophy’.

§ Yet, a whole picture can benefit from an effort to put the pieces together.

§ The worldview of much modern philosophy is that of science—at least tacitly, which is immensely limiting; yet, of course, there are lines of thought that would think ‘outside the box’.

Those who would understand the present work are advised, not to abandon the modern practice, but to not be limited by it.

Living the way – shared pathways

The Way of Being

Experience

experience (experience-of or mind-like, the experienced or object-like or matter-like, relation; sensation, sentience, feeling, perception, thought, imagination, intuition, self-knowledge, agency), value (ethical, aesthetic, significant – in the sense of the ‘meaning of life’), concept (referential form – related to intentionality, referential concept), definition (real, linguistic / axiomatic; circularity of definition and escape), object, meaning (received and/or in use; infixity, indefiniteness, and multiplicity; search in dual space of concepts and objects; atomism and holism), abstraction, knowledge (what – adequacy of representation – pure and pragmatic, for the present purpose; how, criteria; ordinary knowledge, philosophy of perfection and its problems and pure-pragmatic resolution), method, reason (rationality, pure-pragmatic), sophistication (the problem of)

Comment 25. Topics to add to amplify meaning—language, grammar, and syntax (and experimental syntax) and relation to logic, semantics.

Source or study topic 2. Re: method – Abduction (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) –

Source or study topic 3. Re: imagination – Possible Worlds (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy), Impossible Worlds (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy), Imagination (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy), Intuition (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

Comment 26. Combine and minimize method / reason / rationality / pure and pragmatic.

Comment 27. Abstraction does not necessarily de-concretize the referent or result in an abstract object (more on this later).

Comment 28. In contrast to linguistic definitions, in real definitions one locates things or kinds in the world, finds words to specify them, show the specification is valid, and name them; one approach to locating an object and showing validity is abstraction.

Being

Comment 29. Consider reverting to the title, ‘Being and beings’.

Being

a being (plural: beings), being (existence), ontology, metaphysics, foundation (substance – matter, mind / idea / spirit – vs process / relation / word / trope, infinitism, regress, self – superficial vs deep / trivial vs powerful, modal – e.g., necessity), grounding (constitutive determination or explanation)

Comment 30. It should be shown that knowledge—content and method—is immanent in being, perfectly at the ideal (abstracted) level and pragmatically at the concrete level; ideally, the demonstration or ‘showing’ shall be immanent in the concepts.

Beings

experiential (self, other), (experiential) hierarchy (primitive; societies, world; experiential—animal / person / human—god / God / peak / greatest / ultimate), dimensions of being (categories) – pure and pragmatic, real, universe, cosmos, law (natural), the void

Source or study topic 4. dimensions of being

Possibility

possibility (impossibility), coherent possibility (logical possibility), greatest possibility, real possibility, natural possibility, possible being, contingent being, necessary being (relative, logical / absolute)

Comment 31. On universe as realization of logical possibility (i) this does not contradict science or experience for science is—ought to be—silent on what lies beyond the empirical boundary and while our cosmos is one possibility, the other possibilities lie beyond the empirical boundary (ii) the universe would have identity; the universe and its identity would be limitless in variety, extension, duration, peak, and dissolution; there would be cosmoses of limitless number and variety, which may be temporarily causally disconnected from our cosmos; the other cosmoses may be beyond the spacetime boundary of ours or may be passing through ours but without interaction; all beings would inherit the limitlessness of the universe and merge with one another in peaks of being.

Metaphysics

Comment 32. Of course, metaphysical content has already begun with consideration of experience.

Source or study topic 5. For the real metaphysics—Bounded Rationality (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy).

existence (extended to the void), dialetheia, limitlessness of the universe (fundamental principle of metaphysics), metaphysics, ideal metaphysics, real metaphysics, doubt (knowing doubt)

Cosmology

Source or study topic 6. Re: cosmology – Philosophy of Cosmology (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy), Cosmology and Theology (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

Comment 33. A more complete title would be ‘Cosmology – metaphysics continued’

cosmology, general cosmology, concrete objects, abstract objects, knowledge (repeated from experience), value (repeated from experience: ethical, aesthetic, significant – in the sense of the ‘meaning of life’), birth, death (their absolute vs non-absolute nature), cosmology of form and formation (paradigmatic principle and principles, mechanism, determinism, indeterminism, probability, sameness, difference, identity, extension-displacement-space – relation-identity-being – duration-change-time, space-being-time, properties), experiential cosmology (hierarchy, peak, god, gods), physical cosmology, pure dimension of being, pragmatic dimension of being: nature (experiential, living) society (individuals and groups, economics and politics, law, culture, religion), universal

Comment 34. What is religion? The concept should not just be empirical. Conceptual and rational perspectives come from religion as (i) about the real – beyond immediate experience and science via reason (ii) from dogma vs reason (iii) symbolic truth (iii) cultural meaning and social bonding (iv) source of power – within and among cultures and societies (v) lie (vi) and therefore, dialetheic

Source or study topic 7. The experiential aspect of nature is (as-if of) matter and mind. What are politics and economics and how do they join or interact? What are the forces of social division and unity and what is the nature of their interaction – stable or otherwise? What is the law?

Comment 35. On concrete and abstract objects—a received view is that while concrete objects are ones that we sense, take part in causation, and are located in space and time, the status of abstract objects, while they exist, is in question; yet one view is that they are conceived, rather than perceived; here, abstract and concrete objects have the same kind of existential status, that both partake of abstraction and concretion, but the more abstract objects have aspects of existence filtered out in abstraction—thus objects can be more and less abstract; there is, however, a difference in how we treat the more abstract objects such as number (for example); since number has had causation and spatiotemporality filtered out they are not sensed and are therefore (today) usually defined in abstract terms, i.e., by specifying undefined terms, definitions, axioms, and rules of inference; which means that their existence and nature is not guaranteed and must be investigated, e.g., by studying the system as well as systems of inference as objects – and by developing formal methods of such study.

General Cosmology

A theory of form and cause

Computational general cosmology

The theory of general cosmology is that of logic, not physics, and so computation for general cosmology involves the use of imagination applied to generation, theoretical and computational, applied to combinatorial possibilities of the analytic general logic – both general and subject to paradigmatic probabilistic estimation

System of knowledge

Comment 36. Knowledge was discussed in experience, above; the aim here is to discuss the extent of knowledge, the disciplines, their nature, their relations, how they constitute a system; and how all that informs the individual disciplines

disciplines, over-discipline, general logic (with art) and argument, system, formal metaphysics, living or lived metaphysics (a continuum rather than binary distinction and the mutuality of the lived vs the formal)

Source or study topic 8. Politics and economics 101 – use Wikipedia, Samuelson and Nordhaus, and Philosophy of Economics (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy), sources, reflections, solutions (and relation to world problems).

Realization

Comment 37. Sources for this section may be useful for return.

Comment 38. Also need integration with the world.dotm.

Source or study topic 9. pathways (templates and dedication.docm)

Source or study topic 10. traditional ways (yoga.docm in the folder ../../2021/topic essays/)

Source or study topic 11. the way of being—a field manual #realization.

Source or study topic 12. Need more path detail, especially on ‘healthy living’, which will draw from received ways.

Background

The essentials so far for realization are (i) the universe and its identity are limitless in extension, duration, variety, peak, and dissolution (ii) all beings merge in the peaks (iii) there are intelligent and effective pathways from our world and cosmos to the ultimate which are a best balance of pleasure and pain in the process (iv) shared negotiation of pathways beginning in our world are a moral imperative which do not ignore but require attention to the quality of life in the world.

The program and its design

Source or study topic 13. concepts-detail.html#pathways for latest path elements of 11/2/2024

Pathways

Comment 39. The material shaded yellow below was paste special from implications: realization but the link is now broken.

Enlightened ways

The aim of an enlightened, healthy, or effective lifeway or pathway is effective realization of the ultimate, beginning with its best form in this world (i.e., the world of the seeking beings).

A balance of emotion, reason, sharing, and action

Enlightenment seeks balance and integration of emotion, reason (fact, inference), and action in interest (service) of self, other, community, world, and approach to peak being.

Pleasure and pain

Effective pathways

About religion

As far as unjustified belief or disbelief are religious, most people who have a position on the truth of dogmatic religion are religious.

The place of ways from tradition

Path programs

Pathways – concepts

the way of being, ideas, transformation (realization), pathways (lifeways) – shared-intelligent-negotiated paths in the pure and pragmatic dimensions of being, immediate, ultimate (immediate and ultimate as one), pure and pragmatic (aspects of real metaphysics and cosmology), mind and object (aspects of experience); (human) being (as discrete and limited in time, but peak being over long enough or above time), peak being (god, gods, ultimates, all-possible-being-as-one)

Emotion, pleasure and pain – concepts

emption, pleasure, pain, enlightenment (contentment, salvation—inner and outer, individual, and shared, worldly, or immediate and universal or ultimate; intelligent, shared negotiation; therapy; healthy living – physical, mental, communal, and spiritual) as process with or through rather than around pleasure and pain.

Program – concepts

program (everyday, universal), dedication, affirmation, commitment with acceptance of pleasure and pain.

Source or study topic 14. For printable templates, see resources > printable templates (p. 1)

Everyday program

Everyday program – concepts

ideas (the way, metaphysics, science, dimensions of being, art), action (path, meditation, yoga; risk, urgent imperatives; community), ground (discipline, routine, safety, urgent issues, and security; planning – set up a flexible daily schedule with priorities, perhaps in the form of a table)

A program

Comment 40. For details, see the way of being-plain.html and templates and dedication.docm.

Universal program

Universal program – concepts

being in the world (ideas – knowledge and its means, art; pure – yoga, meditation, immersion, ideas to action, retreat and renewal; community – education, work, relationships, paradigmatic action), becoming (immersion in nature and animal being as catalyst and inspiration; immersion and action in society and civilization as a place of being and as vehicle and path to the real; artifact—civilizing the universe, especially with technology; universal – following paths of pragmatic perfection); planning (review phase of life and needs for action in the dimensions of being; assess current situation and review and select activities of focus – immediate, short, and long term; set and review a time frame of action; build these elements into everyday planning)

A program

Comment 41. For details, see the way of being-plain.html and templates and dedication.docm.

Return

Life is reflection and action. A phase of reflection, though not of inaction, comes to fulfilment; it is now time to RETURN to an emphasis on action—a phase emphasizing immersive action and commitment, though not of unreflective life. Narration will continue in-the-world and its foci shall be improvement of the way via imagination and criticism, an issue of what I have not seen due to focused seeing in some regions of the real, and universal narrative—i.e., collapsing the essential history of narrative and thought so as to extract what is essential and to have balance against tendencies to infinite detail and the sheer weight of the cumulative record. Death will be unremarkable in itself, but, if, at death, one is incompletely realized, it will be a gateway to the ultimate.

Comment 42. / Epilogue / Next / Passing the torch / The future

Comment 43. Communication, text, ideas, and being; The future of

Comment 44. Sources for this section may be useful for realization. Sources used for this section will be ~~strikethrough~~. When used for both sections they will be ~~double strikethrough~~.

Source or study topic 15. ~~See~~ ~~the way of being~~~~-plain.html~~; seek other sources.

~~Source or study topic 16.~~ ~~See~~ ~~The Way of Being~~ ~~| A Journey~~ ~~– especially the epilogue.~~

~~Source or study topic 17.~~ ~~See the way of being –~~ ~~outline.html~~.

Comment 45. Some possible section titles follow

On universal narrative

Writing and updating universal narrative

Part III Parallel developments

See outline of the way.

Part IV Reference

See outline of the way.

Resources

Printable templates

every day - home.docm (pdf), every day - away.docm (pdf), universal.docm (pdf)