----Original Message Follows----
Greetings,
Cory. I think you contradict yourself in that you claim fossils (let us drop
the word record) exist
only as a figment of human imagination. If you disagree with that and want
to keep it as 'fossil
record' then I agree with your central point and we have no argument.
Records are, after all and in
a real sense, human constructs. Let me assume for the sake of argument that
you do mean, fossils are
a figment of the human imagination, then you can correct me if I am wrong
and I will retract.
----
Hi Struan
Allow me to elaborate. Fossils, like gravity, exist (let me introduce you to
my mother-in-law sometime if you don't believe me :)) and the ordering of
the fossils into an intellectual record also exists, but this is strictly a
human interpretation of said fossils and what we think they tell us. So when
you ask:
Struan:
Let me
now make the assumption that fossils are the remains of, 'great beasts,'
that, 'certainly,'
'wandered the earth way before humans made an appearance.'
Perhaps you could explain to me how creatures and the remains of creatures
who wandered the earth
before human beings existed, could exist only in the minds of human
imaginations when it has just
been clearly stated that they existed before human imaginations did.
----
Look to the beginning and the end of human imagination. Where is it we all
come from, and where do we go? I cannot say, nor, I dare say, can anyone.
Without human imagination, what would be happening now? Certainly we might
say that "something" would be happening, but what? Scientists tell us that
we are the result of 4+ billion years of evolution on earth and even longer
on a universal scale. Trully mind-boggling. No wonder creationist thinking
maintains a firm foothold in the minds of many.
Struan:
Fossils and dinosaurs cannot
therefore be (just) psychological phenomena unless you can show me that the
human mind predates the
earliest fossil - or even the earth itself if that makes it easier - or even
the universe for that
matter.
----
It would seem a matter of interpretation. Was there ever a time when human
mind did not exist, and if so, how would anyone know it? Take our own paths
to this point in time. We are all the result of a union between sperm and
egg and so there was a "time" for all of us when we had no mind in the
manner which we now do. Yet certainly there must have been a seed crystal
there... something to grow. And time certainly passed even though we
ourselves were unaware of such a passage. Or were we? Maybe we just don't
remember? Did that seed crystal always exist? or is such a question
meaningless? Time is experiential in nature. When I die, will the world
still go on for all of you here? I certainly presume so, but will I have any
way of knowing that?
Struan:
It seems to me that metaphysics is concerned with just that type of problem
and not with the way in
which the human mind understands and divides reality. That is why SOM is not
a metaphysics but a
state of mind. The MoQ may well be the same.
----
Of course it could also be said that metaphysics is concerned not so much
with beginnings and endings but rather with what happens in the middle,
which is where we find ourselves at this particular moment in time.
Personally, I have no problem with SOM and MOQ being metaphysics but that
too is a matter of interpretation and ultimately a state of mind, as you
say.
Thanks for your well-honed questioning.
Cory
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