Hi Mark --
Hi Ham, Looks like you are being kept busy.
Yes, I'm afraid Tim's "frustration" over my thesis has made further discussion an exercise in futility. Perhaps if I let him cool off for awhile, he'll bury his axe and start listening instead of fighting. Isn't it ironic how resistance so often turns to anger just as we are on the verge of understanding?
My question was what do you mean by experienceable. I think you answered the question below, which is along the same lines I was thinking, or maybe not. I was pointing to the idea that we can have concepts that are not experienceable. We imagine them. In the same way, you imagine there to be an absolute essence. I have no problem with that, it is not that far off from other concepts of what is behind all of this.
I suppose we can regard intuition as a kind of imagination. Any metaphysical view of Reality, however, must inevitably contradict our "empirical" view, no matter who the author is. If we can't accept contradiction, we had best put metaphysics aside and amuse ourselves with poetry or music.
I can see that we have physical entities and non-physical entities. Love would be a non-physical entity. We can't measure it, but it certainly exists. For me Eckhart's notion of Is-ness is the notion of presence. All presence is connected by being present. In many ways it connects to the concept of ultimate synchronicity. The notion of Not-other, if I understand you correctly would also be what I refer to as presence. You have a unique way of describing the dichotomy of Is-ness and its complete opposite, in the context we are using it. I think it has value, however, it places our awareness in a very powerful place, which Eckhart would disagree with. This is where I differ from you. In my view, we are the product, not the creator. This outlook simply recognizes what I extrapolate from my common sense. But I guess you already knew my view. Keep going, I get little pieces here and there.
No, we didn't carry our dialogue far enough for me to get a handle on your worldview. It would appear to be an "anything goes" attitude toward reality. This muse which you posted to Tim on 12/10, for example, set him off on a tangent that Quality must be the universal divider:
Quality for me means there are differences between things, and for whatever reason we like some more than others. Rather than such differences arising from the presence of things, we can look at it the other way around and say that it is the differences that creates the things. Thus Quality comes in as the creator, by separating, rather than the result.
For sure we are "products" of a creator, Mark. Where we differ is on the question of what that creator is. I maintain that Quality (i.e., Value) cannot be our creator because we are needed to realize (actualize) it. For the same reason, Beauty doesn't create art, Logic doesn't create math, and Love doesn't create the love object.
Since the term "nothingness" confounds everybody, suppose we adopt Eckhart's 'IS-ness' and coin the word 'Not-IS' to represent its antonym or synthetic other. Whether Essence "negates" this other or simply contains it in its absolute potentialilty is an esoteric matter for the speculators. That 'Not-is' is fundamental to creation, however, cannot be denied. Difference cannot exist without it, whether it's the difference between you and me, between patterns, or between now and then. Where there is "presence" there is also "absence". The most characteristic attribute of existence is that it is differentiated -- an attribute that we have no justification for imputing to the essential Source.
Try plugging this "little piece" into your ontology, Mark, and see how well it fits.
Potentially yours, Ham Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
