The Philosophy of the Self.

the intellectual slant always needs metaphor to define the indefinable.

heaven has to have a name.

the problem is when one mistakes the menu for the meal or sign post for the road.

the problem of duality is not that the synthesis of thesis and antithesis proclaims transcendence; that from two one arises, but from whence the two arise.

that is a feature of space-time.

we are fish swimming in the water of the duality of a universe of which the fundamental feature, electromagnetism, is definable by both particles and waves.

each of us has two choices, either become a zen buddhist monk and contemplate the absurdity of trying to look at our own face, or do as jimmy buffet suggests........ get drunk and screw.

its saturday night and my choice is obvious.

kuvasz. It's Saturday night and I have to get drunk, but boy do I dread it.

Sorry, Fresco. I think kuvasz has more than Georgia on his mind...

Goodnight from Florida

ossobuco

Your appeal for a justification for our elimination of "time" can be "pointed at" but not "argued".

For example, this what the physicist David Bohm said about the status of current physics. (He was an associate of Einstein and a collaborator of Krishnamurti)

How, then, is actual physical time to be incorporated into the theory? Here it should be noted that in the standard quantum-mechanical treatment, this can be done properly only by bringing in an observer who is outside the quantum system under discussion. The time of the quantum system has meaning only in relationship to that of the observer. But what if we wish to include the observer as part of the cosmos? This cannot be done consistently in terms of the usual interpretation of quantum theory.

Now if we set this statement within the context of Bohm's interactions with Krishnamurti (the "awareness" that "time" IS "thought") then "selfhood" becomes "observerhood" and is arbitrary. It also follows that the desire for logicality and (time based) causality to which the naive realists resort in order to keep their feet on the ground, is subject to sudden "earthquake" and may only have local applicability in closed microcosm.

These are difficult concepts because we are trying to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. My own temporary "solid ground" tends to be "functionality". E.g. whether the Earth goes round the Sun or vice versa depends on who you are...farmer or astronomer..."reality" is a function of "transient interactive need" and those needs are "observer specific" (N.B. the pidjin English for the Sun is "kerosene lamp bilong Jesus Christ" and who can argue with that? )

twyvel,

There are technical approches to this problem under such terminology as "supervenience". This term is involved with the interaction of different "levels of description" but the import of such words rests on on a complex discussion of logicality. (See Chalmers via Google).

Letty.

Agreed ..how about "The Sounds of Silence"

Fresco, philsophy without logic is bullshit. If you accept a contradiction, why even bother to consider anything else? Anything and everything follows from a contradiction, so one contradiction makes philosophizing entirely unneeded.

JL, I don't know what you mean, probably because I haven't read all of fresco's Old Dead Guys yet. I think you're using "reality" to gloss over a number of fairly destinct meanings, and that doesn't help the conversation at all. Do you mean that things that are real only exist when we've seen them? Or do you mean that meanings only exist after perception? Or are you talking about something else? I can't tell unless you use specific langauge. I'm sure that everyone else has been on this board long enough that they already know exactly what you think, but I haven't. Please enlighten me. I am tired of all the cryptic Neitszcheisms.

rufio,

You havn't got a chance of knowing what JLN thinks unless you put in a bit of effort with the literature. I think JLN has been courteous with you beyond the call of duty so far, but playing an amateur game of "enfant terrible" and "having the last word" is wearing a bit thin.

You'll have to help me out here, fresco. I'm not really conversant with the metaphysics of "Star Trek" (that's the "Borg" you're referring to, right? It's not tennis star Bjorn Borg), so I'm not quite sure what "we are the Borg" means.

Thats right Joe. On Star Trek the Borg is a collective of conjoint consciousnesses like intelligent ants in a hive. Any individual "unit" is dispensible in the cause of the collective. (The only collective cause worth bothering about being assimilation of all other intelligent life forms...hence the familiar battle cry: "WE ARE THE BORG. YOU WILL BE ASSIMILATED. RESISTANCE IS FUTILE"...reminding us all of those Spanish Christian missionaries).

truth
Kuvazs, my reading of the nature of "the veil of maya" is not that it conceals from us an underlying truth, if by that we mean ANOTHER THEORETICAL VIEW OF REALITY to replace that of maya. To remove the veil of maya is to simply see the artificial nature of our sense of our reality--namely, as I've been suggesting, it's artificiality. I don't say the "arbitrariness" of our theoretical schemes, because they DO serve us in various ways: they may be ULTIMATELY not in correspondence with reality (whatever that might mean), but they may be theories that "pay off" pragmatically (for a while at least) or they may have deep aesthetic and spiritual value for us (like your Christianity does for you, if I recall correctly). When the veil of maya is lifted, when we see how we constructed (pictured or created our world, pretty much as an artist creates her worlds) we are then free to relax and enjoy the wonder and atheoretical sensuality of our lives. As the zen monk might tell us, just enjoy your tea.
Now, we are discussing very deep things here, and I must confess that despite my tone, I am ultimately an agnostic when it comes to the THEORETICAL issues before us. Just imagine if I were right! I would have the theoretical key to the world. Earthshaking! Unlikely. But no matter, I've have learned to enjoy my tea. Breakfast is ready. I'll be right back.

truth
Kuvazs, you are making very interesting contributions here. The phrase, "we are fish swimming in the water of the duality of a universe of which the fundamental feature, electromagnetism, isdefinableby both particles and waves" is very provocative. I wonder, however, if the string theorists turn out to be right (I should say "better" because who knows how long their construction will reign. I'm thinking of Newton and then Einstein), then the duality theory may be replaced by a unitary one. Who knows. The Chinese notion of the Yin and Yang as fundamental constituents of the world IS dualistic, and a useful model. But, as I've insisted, only a model. The question is whether or not it is useful as some kind of a guide. I like to think that we are dualistic fish swimming in the unity of a universe, and that our dualism is our construction and, while it is essential for practical matters, e.g., the binary system of computers, it is very limiting for our spiritual well-being.

Osso, your introduction of the variable,TIME, is very appropriate. To me the greatest relavance of time is that it expresses the fundamental characteristic of our experience, namely that CHANGE or impermanence is omnipresent and basic. That nothing is fixed as an absolute object of orientation. We live in a world of verbs, but can only deal with it logically in terms of fixed nouns and adjectives.

truth
Twyvel, you note, after Krishnamurti, that cause and effect only come into existence upon being observed. I don't think we SEE cause and effect as immediate phenomena; we THINK them. When I see an event and wish to know how or why it came about, I usually want to know its history, what are the necessary and sufficient antecedents of that event. If I know that I might be able to conjure the event by creating its antecedents. I see an event and, for explanatory purposes, I treat it as an EFFECT (there are no effects in nature only in our heads. Casuality is not a description of the world it is an explanatory technique--and we must remember that explanations are merely satisfying answers to our questions). I then try to find its CAUSE or causes. Contrary to common sense, EFFECT PRECEDES CAUSE. Our model says that, ontologically, the cause is antecedent to its effect, but epistemologically, we define an effect AND AFTERWARDS look for its cause(s). I once noted that the philsosopher, Hume, said (and I can't find the source) that when we see a pool stick strike a cue ball and then the cue ball moves to and strikes an object ball, we have only seen a moving stick stop where it reaches a cue ball and then the cue ball moves to an object ball and stops when it reaches it. In order to EXPLAIN this phenomenal event, we THINK up causal forces, like "transmitted energy" moving from stick to ball and ball to ball. In this sense, he said (I think) that the ideas of cause and effect are "good to think with". This is why I conclude that some fictions are beneficial if they are useful. The practice of geometry does not describe the world I experience but it helps to make bridges that do not collapse. A chink in my model here is that there must be some objective/material reasons that geometry has this beneficial effect on bridges. I havn't solved that yet--but such anomalies indicate to me that while my view of the world and the nature of explanation and truth satisfies me, it is limited in its scope.
By the way, do you see sunyatta (the void) as something that is observable? I agree that all "aspects" (trying to avoid "things") of the World are interdependent, but this is only a way of describing its oneness, not the relationship of its "parts". Remember, the "parts" (things) only come into existence by means of observation and conception. Nevertheless, the ground of their being IS objective. It just isn't describable; it's empty of form, something like Kant's noumena (a discredited notion) forms the basis for phenomena.

truth
Twyvel, your absolute idealism, if that's what it can be called, is not something I would reject, even though my view (which is always tentative and evolving, I hope) represents an attempt to accomodate my mystical predelictions with my less spiritual understandings of the material world. I have seen you misunderstood too much on these threads to jump to conclusions without first trying to understand you. What I do understand from your posts has been very rewarding. Give me some time to meditate on your position before I answer.

Oh crap, this is what I get for posting to a thread with a bunch of Brainiacs.

First, to

Jl noddy

"Kuvazs, my reading of the nature of "the veil of maya" is not that it conceals from us an underlying truth, if by that we mean ANOTHER THEORETICAL VIEW OF REALITY to replace that of maya. To remove the veil of maya is to simply see the artificial nature of our sense of our reality--namely, as I've been suggesting, it's artificiality. I don't say the "arbitrariness" of our theoretical schemes, because they DO serve us in various ways: they may be ULTIMATELY not in correspondence with reality (whatever that might mean), but they may be theories that "pay off" pragmatically (for a while at least) or they may have deep aesthetic and spiritual value for us (like your Christianity does for you, if I recall correctly). When the veil of maya is lifted, when we see how we constructed (pictured or created our world, pretty much as an artist creates her worlds) we are then free to relax and enjoy the wonder and atheoretical sensuality of our lives. As the zen monk might tell us, just enjoy your tea."

We are not replacing one illusion, Maya [the world], for another. It is considered the Ground of Being beyond the Veil that is revealed, completely independent of the observer or self…..perhaps on the other side of the outer limit of personal integrity Jesus was pointing to, perhaps not

Which seems to dovetail a bit with the citation by twvwel's and fresco's mention of krishnamurti and bohm (great book on time, by the way) about difficulty of the time/self factor integral to quantum observation.


BTW I am not a Christian. I prefer wine to tea, except earl grey.

On to Rufio

"Fresco, philsophy without logic is bullshit. If you accept a contradiction, why even bother to consider anything else? Anything and everything follows from a contradiction, so one contradiction makes philosophizing entirely unneeded."

The logic of reason that demands philosophy have reason is dependent upon sensate review.

And we find now with aforesaid quantum theory that objects can exist between two states of "potentiality" and are "real" only when observed.. Schroedinger's cat is dead, unless it is alive, we don't know until we look to see. Its life and death are dependent only upon looking at it. In the world of quantum facts, the cat itself exists only as potentiality.

Is that logical? It appears to the macro-universe to be absurd. And we live and garner our sensation in this macro-universe. So, We have by logic proved the world to be illogical, so what is the problem with an illogical philosophy unless one demands a locality of the logic in only one place. Which counters completely Kant's idea that universals are by definition, well, universal.

Jlnoddy

"Kuvazs, you are making very interesting contributions here. The phrase, "we are fish swimming in the water of the duality of a universe of which the fundamental feature, electromagnetism, isdefinableby both particles and waves" is very provocative. I wonder, however, if the string theorists turn out to be right"

Fresco and I met about 2 years ago and discussed exactly the knower-known scenario of the universe, and he knows my use of the Flatland metaphor to "logically" accept the concept of higher dimensions of order of which human sentience is unaware of at all. Such planes of existence may well be in those other universes described in string theory where the gravitational constant or Planck's constant are different than ours and a resulting universe not be dependent upon a dual nature of matter.

(I will leave the Anthropomorphic Principle to another thread.)

I just don't live in one of those universes and I can't get there from here. So I am stuck with what I have, waves and particles

Further

Jlnoddys

"I like to think that we are dualistic fish swimming in the unity of a universe, and that our dualism is our construction and, while it is essential for practical matters, e.g., the binary system of computers, it is very limiting for our spiritual well-being."
"There Are More Things In Heaven And Earth, Horatio,Than Are Dreamt Of In Your Philosophy."

Kuvasz

truth
Kuvazs, you are not Christian and I am not JLNoddy--it's bad enough to be "nobody", but not someone else.
I prefer when talking about the UNITY of Reality to say--although I rarely do because it's so clumsy--"not two".

truth
Tywvel, I agree with everything you say. Yet I still think what I've said is valid. What I must do--and I believe it can be done if I'm clear-sighted enough--is to reconcile the positions. I need time, and I need time not to construct a theoretical synthesis; I need time to SEE how our positions mesh concretely. When it comes to your kind of "thinking" seeing, or inSIGHT is most important (as I've said before). I want to "report" what I see, not argue for a presumably logical proposition. By the way, I do think that The Buddha is called The Awakened One not because he awakened from his dreams. He was awakened in the sense that he knew---he realized--that he was dreaming. This interpretation came to me once when in the area of California's Salton Sea I saw a mirage. It looked like a body of water in the distance, but I knew it for what it was: a mirage, but a REAL mirage and a FALSE body of water. Our dreaming is real; my delusions are real, but they ARE DELUSIONS. Seeing that--not just adopting the proposition that all is delusiosn, but actually SEEING it by watching how one's mind operates--is to be awakened.