Hi Ham, As always, we differ slightly in our philosophies, and I do not want to belabor that difference. I present some reply below simply as my opinion on the subject.
I appreciate your well thought out replies, and they force me to find better ways to express my philosophy which in turn takes me to new levels. For this I thank you. On Mon, Dec 12, 2011 at 5:34 PM, Ham Priday <[email protected]> wrote: [Mark had said in jest:] >> Hmmm the use of a double negative sounds familiar from somewhere... > > > You're alluding, of course, to my 'negated nothingness' theory of Difference > creation. But that's a cosmology, not a doubly-negated attitude or > persuasion. If one is opposed to opposition, does that make him an > "anti-anti oppositionist"? If a politican is an anti-anti-conservative, > does that mean he is a "moderate"? You see the problem, Mark? Mark: Quite honestly I do not see much difference. Your double negation seems to me to be no different from our "pulling out" from essence that which delivers value. Excluding an exclusion (double negate) takes us right back to "realizing" value from the all inclusive Essence of potentiality. In common parlance this is called "Creation". If a politician is an anti-anti-conservative it means he does not associate himself with the anti-conservative movement. It does not necessarily mean that he is a moderate. It just means that he is against the stand of the anti-conservatives. If one is opposed to opposition, it means that he does not believe that opposition is the correct way to deal with things. Of course this is illogical semantic nonsense, like "understanding our understanding". What does that second phrase mean? Is it a squared function of some kind, or is it a set of all sets kind of thing? Besides fear not, for everything I tell you is wrong. Yes, even that. Don't get too caught up in the logic behind rhetoric, it is meant to give you a picture, not an equation. > [Mark before on Objective Reality] >> This dictum of "objective reality as existence" is precisely what we >> are questioning in order to formulate a more revealing picture. [Mark on the sense of Control]>> >> A philosophical endeavor is to question this "control in our world". >> I would submit that we "deal" with this world, but are far from >> controlling it, and it is this sense of control which has led to our >> current predicament (if such a thing exists). When we sail and use >> the wind to propel us along, we are far from controlling the wind. >> We are simply dealing with the wind as it presents itself, in the same >> way that a river deals with the landscape it is flowing through. The >> river cannot be said to "control" the terrain it is flowing through; >> it cannot control those illusive forces which guide it from higher to >> lower. >> > >[Ham] > Mark, I have said before that man's freedom is limited to the physical > parameters of existence. By investigating and defining these parameters, > however, we can predict tsunamis and hurricanes, identify dangerous or > injurious environments, and thereby avoid situations that might otherwise > harm us. Is this not a measure of control? I prefer the term adaptation, since it provides a more realistic picture in my view. I can ask you, do we have control of our destiny? If so, how? Do we have control over how our brain works? If so, what part of the brain controls the rest of the brain? If our brain is in control, then what controls it? I am not pointing to a world we can only experience like a movie, I am questioning your sense of control. From where does this control emanate? If it is spiritual, where is the connection between the spiritual and the material? That is, how does the spiritual become material? > [Ham on the Proprietary Self and its relative existence] >>> Secondly, when you say we "can't make any sense of the notion of >>> descriptions of reality that are objective in the sense of being true >>> without regard to human practice," aren't you comfirming the fact that >>> existence is relative? And if human understanding is based on our >>> experience of existence, the truths we derive from this experience must >>> be relative as well. (One of them is that we live in a relational world, >>> which neither proves nor disproves an ultimate, non-relational Reality.) >> >> [Mark previously questioning the term relative as it pertains to relativism of existence] >> As I have questioned Marsha, I will ask you: Relative to what? What >> is existence related to? What tool of comparison do we use to >> juxtapose existence? >> >> A relational world is opposed to a relative world (how's that for a >> dictum?). > > > I don't see why you and Marsha have so much trouble with the relativity > concept. The fact that experience is proprietary to each self means that > knowledge is relative to the knower. Thus, if I am unable to swim, I have a > different conception of the ocean than the swimmer does. Again, if you are > allergic to peanuts, you will experience peanut brittle in a different way > than I do. All events and objects are differentiated by the way we > experience them, and that experience is relative and unique for each > individual. So our knowledge of what is "good" or "bad", desirable or > repulsive, is really subjective in essence. In other words, because Value > is relative to the sensibility of the observer, very litle of what we know > can be considered "universal truth". Mark OK, I was caught up in Relativism. I did a google search on relative and copied the first hit that came up and pasted the first three definitions: rel·a·tive, adj. 1. Having pertinence or relevance; connected or related. 2. Considered in comparison with something else: the relative quiet of the suburbs. 3. Dependent on or interconnected with something else; not absolute. I was using the second definition, which is what I believe Relativism uses, that is, your existence is compared to somebody elses existence. If we simplify this as you did, focusing on knowledge, I would say: saying that knowledge is connected to the knower seems a bit redundant. To say it is relative implies that personal knowledge and the knower are two different things. Can there be a knower without knowledge? Can there be knowledge without a knower? Your inability to swim emanates from you, it is not connected to you, it IS you. Perhaps a better term would be "emanate". Experience emanates from each self, since we cannot distinguish the self and what it experiences. emanate [ˈɛməˌneɪt] vb 1. (intr; often foll by from) to issue or proceed from or as from a source 2. (tr) to send forth; emit Above you stated "very little is universal truth" which we can deal with that at a later date since this has an impact on Essentialism. I am curious on your use of the word "little". This word is a can of worms, let's go fishing some time! > [Mark on the vagaries of Proof] >> A proof is a structure which gives an axiom substance. However >> such a proof is based on assumptions. The assumptions cannot be >> proven although often the derived proof is then reversed to prove the >> assumptions. We see accepted proofs fall apart with non-Euclidean >> geometry, for example, simply because such "non" geometry does not >> accept the Euclidean assumptions. When we do not accept that >> objective reality is the ground from which to work from, your original >> statement concerning such reality also falls apart. > >[Ham on the direct correlation between our assumptions and living experience] > We get our "assumptions" from living experience. Even the laws of math and > logic are derived experientially. The only "proof" we can ascertain is from > those axioms that work. It's the scientific approach to knowledge that we > call objective pragmatism. I'm not sure exactly what you're trying to prove > here, but existentiality does provide a reliable and consistent "ground to > work from", despite the relational differences in human perception. Ham, do you really think you get your assumptions from living "experience"? What "experience" do you have that the existential philosophers, that you like to bring in, "existed"? You assume that this is the case (of course this is quite healthy for such structure you emanate). What "experience" do you have that the earth travels around the sun? I would claim that most of your assumptions have been handed down to you through the written word, or some elderly tale. Living experience has provided very little to you in the academic setting except for faith in what you read. Again, I am not saying that you are incorrect to place much value on these things that are "passed along to you". But, most of it is in your head. The laws of math are NOT derived experientially. Perhaps you are thinking of counting bushels of hay or something. I am speaking of math, not its application. The math of physics is very different from pure math. In set theory, what is the experience of "the set of all sets?" Please point to that for me. What is the experience of infinity? I have yet to bump into it in a dark alleyway. I have yet to see 1+1=2 on my hikes through the mountains, and I have looked under every rock. How is it that I can pragmatically experience that? It does not exist outside of our heads. The scientific approach is putting one's hand in the shower to see if it is hot, and then moving on to the enthalpy of vaporization from there. It is collecting data, predicting a theory and then fitting the data to that theory. Then using the theory to predict data to be generated. Of course if the data is used to generate the theory, then the theory will generate the data. Trouble is, out at the edges it becomes difficult to fit the data back in, so the theory is expanded to account for it. Sooner or later a better theory comes in for fitting and generating data, and so it goes on an on ad infinitum. It's like building a house and having to keep adding rooms for the new children. Sooner or later it becomes more practical to just buy a new house. These days we are trying to build a house that will house all of our data. But there will still always be those edges requiring a new room and eventually a new house. Of course I am not touching on the "House of our Lord" (heh, heh). This is the process of creating a reality. What works today may not work tomorrow. It is our subjective interpretation of what works that belies the objectivity of science. If peasants put garlic on their doors, the vampires do not attack. Therefore this idea "works" and proves the existence of vampires. Much of science works through this "absence" methodology even thought scientist do not realize they are creating a vampire. There is nothing objective to it, we are connecting the stars in the sky as we subjectively see fit. Newtonian mechanics is a constellation. > You claim to be a scientist; yet a scientist would never form a conclusion > from a flip of a coin or mere intuition. Instead he would examine the > object, determine its composition and physical properties, and categorize it > in relation to other objects of its type. The truth he arrives at is > objective, and it's enough to satisfy our need for relational (i.e., > empirical) knowledge. Metaphysical Truth is a different matter altogether, > as it can only be "intuited", never experienced. Which is why I maintain > that the simplest way to understand Reality is to acknowledge its two forms > or modes: Essence and Existence. Yes, I claim to be a scientist only because I make a living at it. I also claim to be many other things. I claim to be what I express or emanate. For that is my Quality. All of what you present above is a subjective interpretation of that which is "relative" to you. How do you separate yourself from what you determine? How is it that what you experience with your mind in your "physical properties evaluation" is different from what you experience with your mind in terms of metaphysics? You yourself said that knowledge is particular to the knower. Does some knowledge somehow become unparticular? > > > Do you really believe I'm caught up in the "dogmatic structure of the 21st > century", Mark? Yup! All this talk of pragmatic knowledge and how science is devoid of subjectivity. It seems to me that you are. You are happy with making objects out of everything and labeling them all with words as if that is what knowledge is all about. I see a cluttered mind (mine is cluttered too, and I am currently using the maid service provided by MoQ). > Perhaps it's because, unlike some cultists, I refuse to pretend that > objective existence is an illusion, a myth or "pattern" of no significance. > This is the reality you and I participate in, and the fact that it is > impermanent sheds 'intuitive light' on the probability that there is a > permanent reality underlying all existence. Perhaps you refuse to pretend that you are pretending. In this case you could be an anti-anti-pretender. > > Peace, and a joyous holiday season to you and yours, > Ham And you! Mark > > 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 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
