Reality from the view point of theists

@Fido,

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You are correct in that eixtence, or being, or reality, or truth are all meanings and meanings are values and judgement of people, made by people in relation to their own lives which to them are all of meaning...Consider, that when we communicate, we share meaning; so, what is the meaning that one could share who may some day be the last of humanity??? What is meaning to one without another??? Meaning is the essential element of being, and if you remove the meaning you have robbed anything that today exists because of meaning of its existence... If you look at our forms, everything that can be described with numbers, that is, physical objects can be said to have meaning and being... If you look at moral forms you see qualities having only meaning... Does that mean that Justice, or liberty do not exist because they have no being??? So long as we give forms like Justice, or Liberty meaning they will have in meaning the essential element of being... Ask if Anti matter, or nothing exists... So long as they have meaning they will have being, though that being is nothing other than our own by virtue of another moral form: our lives...

If there is an objective REALITY...it does not make any difference whether something or someone is able to describe it...and it most assuredly does not necessarily depend for its existence upon the agreement of an observer.

That thought is merely a tenet in the religion you people are promoting. It is a guess about the REALITY. But the REALITY is whatever IS...and I am not convinced any of you people know what the REALITY is.

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@Fido,

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We can discuss nothing without giving weight and value to our words, and so, out of the store of meaning that is our lives we have given meaning to something that has no being; but whether it has being is secondary as a question... Being is a certain meaning, but how much of our lives, and even our lives entirely do we give to uncertain meanings that out of their meaning, which is our own meaning - seem worth many lives??? People do not die for the properties of salt, or the effects of gravity... They willingly sacrifice their lives when their lives are all they may be said to possess for ideas, and opinions regarding ideas, and when they do so, how can they say their ideas, their meanings without being were less real than they were themselves...Life is the most impossible and unreal thing, and it is out of that unreality that we judge things real though reality is only a meaning...

Not sure what you are getting at there, Fido…but the bottom line is that whatever IS…IS. And whatever IS…is an objective REALITY.

I can make guesses about that REALITY…just as you are making guesses, but why bother?

Neither of us knows...and all we would be doing is sharing guesses.

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@Frank Apisa,

Kermit the frog was starving to death because although he was surrounded by what Miss Piggy could see were dead flies, Kermit's physiology could only detect moving ones. Miss Piggy however also did not recognize dead flies as "food" so she could not advise Kermit that he need not starve to death.

"Isn't reality a bitch!" said the turtle. Mr. Green

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@fresco,

Quote:

Kermit the frog was starving to death because although he was surrounded by what Miss Piggy could see were dead flies, Kermit's physiology could only detect moving ones. Miss Piggy however also did not recognize dead flies as "food" so she could not advise Kermit that he need not starve to death.

"Isn't reality a bitch!" said the turtle.

Humorous, Fresco...but not germane.

If there is EXISTENCE...then there is an OBJECTIVE REALITY of that existence. What IS....IS.

You still have not dealt with this.

It would be nice if you would.

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@Fido,

Idiot.

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@Frank Apisa,

That's okay Frank, put it down as an example of "frogs before swine". Wink

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@Frank Apisa,

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Frank Apisa wrote:

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Correct and incorrect... The world may be there whether we discuss it or not, but if we are not there to discuss it, as will some day be the case, then it does not exist...

How do you KNOW this…or is this just a guess about what really is?

And if this is what really is…does that make it an objective REALITY?

It is more a guess as to what isn't... I lost a nerve once because of an injury; so it kind of gives you a sense of what people who have had lobotomies know about their former thought, which is about nothing... What philosophers have told us about reality since the late middle ages is still true today, and the phenomenologist as far as I know have only added to that knowledge... What we can say we know, even about physical reality is slight, and we have that as a sort of analogy... The difference between the thought and the thing is heterogeny, and the likeness between the thought and the thing is homogeny; but of all that we can say we know, our thought represents so little of the thing that we can by no right say we KNOW anything... Our analogies, such as they are, are only meanings... Concepts, ideas, forms are all certain meanings pointed at things, but what are these meanings without people to experience them??? What is the far side of the cosmos without people to experience that??? People certainly rate the far side of the cosmos as having more than zero meaning because they can relate it to the world around us that does have meaning... Whether we are talking of numbers or words we are talking about meanings, and meaning is life, and the reason I say that is because Nominalists like Duns Scotus could see the dualism between the thought and the thing... Initially, to the nominalists, the name of the thing was just the concept of the thing, and not the substance... I see that the substance is just the substance, and the name is just the name, and we must exist in some fashion to give both concept/name, and substance- its meaning... It does not matter what is, or if is... The fundamental question of life, and one that has long since made life possible is: What is the meaning of ( ), insert your substance here... The brik a brak or a life time often hits the dumpster before the corpse is cold, and what is the meaning of it all without the life that found meaning in it???... Will the stars shine and night fall when no human lives to witness it??? Stars, and shine, and will, and fall, and night and human will not have meaning with out humans to weigh out that particular value... So; I would say that so long as any sort of life exists something of substance will have meaning, but it takes human being alive to feel meaning as we do...

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Our existence is the essential element of all being...

How do you KNOW this…and if you are just guessing, why would you possibly guess that way? And if you are correct, is it not an objective REALITY?

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It may well be, as many things are- with or without our attention; but our being gives all that is its meaning...

How do you KNOW this? And if it is correct, can we say that it is an objective REALITY?

I know nothing... Just as Setanta... I think everything, and give insight free rein... As you can see, I have read some on the subject... I can clearly see that people are troubled with thinking in a rational fashion.... Where we can think clearly is of the physical world, and it is there when we can study objects as object that we can say we know, though objectively we have only scratched the surface of knowledge... It the moral world we cannot claim as much... We could talk our whole live through about forms like Justice, liberty, love, and truth to name but a few, and in the end the name is pretty much what we would know... Can we say there is such a thing as love because we have the name, even though the name means something different to all who think they feel it... There is not thing there called love no matter how much we loot for it... Whether we talk about love or the world, whether we talk about God, or existence what we have in common is a word, and the word cannot be judged true to the substance it is pointed at since the object, even when it is substancial is always in flux... We can talk about the world, but if every day 8 tons of moon dust falls on the earth, then what earth are we talking of: The one before the eight tons fell, or the one after it fell, or the one after that... The meaning of the word depends upon us, and the meaning of everything depends upon us, but though it is evident, and even obvious there is no possibility of objective truth in the matter since there is no object...It is the concept of things that brings them into reality for us... Before a concept of gravity as a force was arrived at, what was gravity to people???And what is gravity without people??? It may exist, but without people it will have no meaning... Existence, even will have no meaning...

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@Frank Apisa,

Frank Apisa wrote:

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You need to think... Being, existence, reality, truth are all forms of meaning, and without people and life, there is no meaning....

Where do you folk get this stuff from? How can you say this with such certainty? And if you are positive of it…is it not the objective REALITY?

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And why am I bothering??? I know you are not intelligent enough to get it...

That is the ultimate cop-out, Fido...and has no place in this discussion.

Sorry, Frank... I read all the time... I have got a lot from Kant and Heidegger, especially a book on Heidegger by Safranski, Martin Heidegger- Between Good and Evil... Which I quoted almost verbatim last post... As far as Setanta... I let him get on my nerves... He is as solid as a brick and just as fast... He will never get people like me...

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@Frank Apisa,

Frank Apisa wrote:

Quote:
You are correct in that eixtence, or being, or reality, or truth are all meanings and meanings are values and judgement of people, made by people in relation to their own lives which to them are all of meaning...Consider, that when we communicate, we share meaning; so, what is the meaning that one could share who may some day be the last of humanity??? What is meaning to one without another??? Meaning is the essential element of being, and if you remove the meaning you have robbed anything that today exists because of meaning of its existence... If you look at our forms, everything that can be described with numbers, that is, physical objects can be said to have meaning and being... If you look at moral forms you see qualities having only meaning... Does that mean that Justice, or liberty do not exist because they have no being??? So long as we give forms like Justice, or Liberty meaning they will have in meaning the essential element of being... Ask if Anti matter, or nothing exists... So long as they have meaning they will have being, though that being is nothing other than our own by virtue of another moral form: our lives...

If there is an objective REALITY...it does not make any difference whether something or someone is able to describe it...and it most assuredly does not necessarily depend for its existence upon the agreement of an observer.

That thought is merely a tenet in the religion you people are promoting. It is a guess about the REALITY. But the REALITY is whatever IS...and I am not convinced any of you people know what the REALITY is.

That is a presumption that it does not make any difference... In fact, the uncertainty principal in physics says it makes every difference... We all presume a pre-existing existence... Okay, as far as that goes it is pretty harmless... When people forget that their thought of the thing is not the thing they are thinking of, but only a representation, then they tend to subtract humanity wholesale from the whole experience of knowledge and existence, and for one, I do not see the point of missing the whole point of the exercise...

I will agree with you that non of us knows what reality is, or if that is even possible since as an infinite we cannot have knowledge of it for if you believe Kant we can only have knowledge of finite objects, the stuff of science... We all know what reality means, though its meaning is different for all of us, related as it is to our own lives...

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@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

Idiot.

Dolt.

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@Fido,

Idiot

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@Fido,

Fido…I want to pay complete respect to your take on this, but in order to do so, I have to be sure of what you are saying. So let’s take this slowly…and rather than cover many topics at one time, let us concentrate on one.

You originally wrote:

Quote:

The world may be there whether we discuss it or not, but if we are not there to discuss it, as will some day be the case, then it does not exist...

I asked if this were something you knew…or if it were a guess.

Your response went on for many sentences…but I did not see a specific answer.

You made a specific (and extraordinary) assertion there: When we humans cease to be, the world will no longer exist.

I cannot imagine how anyone could gain that knowledge...so I cannot imagine this to be anything more than a guess…and a wild guess at that.

But I do want to be sure.

Please…keep the answer as simple as possible so that I can know for certain what you are trying to say.

I will then ask the second part of my original question, which is:

If the assertion is correct (without regard to whether it is knowledge or a wild guess)…IF IT IS CORRECT THAT WHEN HUMANS ARE GONE, THE WORLD WILL CEASE TO EXIST…

…is that not an objective REALITY of existence?

Be sure you understand what I am asking: If you are correct in that assertion, does that not make it the OBJECTIVE REALITY of existence?

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@Fido,

Fido, your recent comments are definitely not idiotic. I particularly appreciate your intuition (much more than a "wild guess") that "When we humans cease to be, the world will no longer exist." Here, of course, the problem is our understanding of the term "World" . Whatever it is, it IS. In that sense I agree with Frank's central point. If the world ceases to exist after the end of all humans, THAT will be the objective reality. If it does not cease to exist, THAT too will be the objective reality. No problem within the framework of Frank's version of this OP.
But I do--within the context of Reality's objective existence--feel, intuit, sense--non-dualistically--that there is a strong subjective dimension. Consistent with Schopenhauer's idealism (subjectivism), that the world dies with him, because, has he claims, the world IS his idea, I claim that I will live "forever", MY forever, and that when I die that forever will cease to be (for others), but for me, as a subjective entity, it will have reached its fulfillment. Also, when I die the world (MY world) will go with me. My house will cease to be for me while it will continue to exist for others. And this complex and contradicting pattern will be what objective reality is about--from my perspective that is. And there are only perspectives. To deny that, to assume a single overarching and "real" perspective, is to proclaim the existence of a God (defined by His hegemonic or omnicompetent perspective). In this sense I see no contradiction between objectivity and subjectivity, on the one hand, and absolutism and relativism on the other. I do deny that the world is EITHER objective and absolute OR subjective and relativistic: it is BOTH.

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@JLNobody,

Would you agree that the resolution of dualities is a "God's Eye"position or at least a transcendent ineffable view of "reality". And if so, it only pays lip service to our day to day usage of the word "reality" which is always context dependent. In other words, in attempting to escape context, we are stuck with a choosing a word for the ineffable and we plump for "reality" in the hope that its de facto unattainable "objectivity" connotation can be ultimately realized at some "higher level".

If you concur, then you might also agree that the "God'Eye" position is why advocates of "an objective reality" can be seen as the equivalent of theists.

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@fresco,

Fresco...there is an element of "theism" in this discussion, but it is coming from people like you, not from me.

I am an agnostic. I do not know the answers to ultimate questions...and I am willing to acknowledge that I do not know. I have no problem, however, offering what I have on the "objective REALITY" issue, because that resolves itself in common sense.

But...don't use REALITY if it offends your sensibilities.

What IS...IS, however...and if you use that, you should end up at the same station.

"What IS", Fresco, is objective...even though we apparently cannot know it; describe it; or, in a sense, even appreciate it. What actually IS...ACTUALLY IS.

I think by now you actually realize you have been wrong all along on the question of whether or not there is an objective REALITY. Unfortunately, your ego is preventing you from acknowledging it. That happens often in these kinds of discussions...no problem As I said earlier, it doesn't make you a bad person.

There is, by the way, a "cuteness" to trying to shape the product of this extensive discussion in words like: "...advocates of 'an objective reality' can be seen as the equivalent of theists." I truly thank you for the laugh I got from that (less than effective) attempt at irony.

But that sort of things is desperation...and is going nowhere. JL already sees, and is willing to acknowledge, the definitional problem with the assertion "there is no objective REALITY." Not sure where you are on the issue, but obviously you are not at the point where you can acknowledge the problem if you do see it.

Too bad that.

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@Frank Apisa,

Frank, what would normally cure a case of vacuous "IS-nitis" is a consideration of the fact that in Spanish there are two verbs for "to be", (Ser and Estar) meaning different things. But since all my references to normality have been categorized by yourself as pontification or dogmatism (in a manner that would earn someone PhD on the subject of Freudian projection) I have no expectation that you will be respond to the cure.

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@fresco,

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Frank, what would normally cure a case of vacuous "IS-nitis" is a consideration of the fact that in Spanish there are two verbs for "to be", (Ser and Estar) meaning different things.

I will keep that in mind in case we ever argue anything in Spanish, Fresco. But that possible happening has absolutely nothing whatever to do with what we are discussing here in English.

Said another way: Nice try at avoiding the issues raised...but no cigar!

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But since all my references to normality have been categorized by yourself as pontification or dogmatism (in a manner that would earn someone PhD on the subject of Freudian projection) I have no expectation that you will be respond to the cure.

Now I have to add "hyperbole" to the mix. Be careful of the use of the word "all", Fresco. I have not categorized ALL of your references to normality as pontificati0n or dogmatism. And if I had, it would hardly be "projection", Freudian or otherwise.

At some point, you really should deal with the issues I raised in my last post, Fresco.

Any time you are ready.

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@Frank Apisa,

You must be joking. God forbid that an atheist like me should get away with questioning the sanctity of your agnosticism !

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@Frank Apisa,

Frank Apisa wrote:

Fido…I want to pay complete respect to your take on this, but in order to do so, I have to be sure of what you are saying. So let’s take this slowly…and rather than cover many topics at one time, let us concentrate on one.

You originally wrote:

Quote:
The world may be there whether we discuss it or not, but if we are not there to discuss it, as will some day be the case, then it does not exist...

I asked if this were something you knew…or if it were a guess.

Your response went on for many sentences…but I did not see a specific answer.

You made a specific (and extraordinary) assertion there: When we humans cease to be, the world will no longer exist.

I cannot imagine how anyone could gain that knowledge...so I cannot imagine this to be anything more than a guess…and a wild guess at that.

But I do want to be sure.

Please…keep the answer as simple as possible so that I can know for certain what you are trying to say.

I will then ask the second part of my original question, which is:

If the assertion is correct (without regard to whether it is knowledge or a wild guess)…IF IT IS CORRECT THAT WHEN HUMANS ARE GONE, THE WORLD WILL CEASE TO EXIST…

…is that not an objective REALITY of existence?

Be sure you understand what I am asking: If you are correct in that assertion, does that not make it the OBJECTIVE REALITY of existence?

If I have the nominalists correct, then the being comes before conception, and it is not conception that brings something into existence... But if we should say cosmos, or existence, or God, or reality, even humanity then these are word labels for concepts that work only so long as the human mind is there to hold them as a certain meaning....

Whether or not a thing exists cannot be said to rest upon a single human life, but existence is itself a concept, or a quasi concept that has meaning because we exist, and not necessarily because it exists...Now, I can agree with the nominalists that the object must be for people to conceive of it, but that does not stop people from using their imaginations to conceive of spiritual values, moral forms, or transcendent concepts that have no value or being other than as meaning, and it is the meaning that gives them their value...

If you look at knowledge you are not looking at an actual thing but the means of represnting what we know of a thing; and a concept, say, of an atom is all that we may say is true of it... And we can have knowledge of it in the finite sense because we can conceive of it as a finite object... If we say existence, we are talking of an infinite- since we cannot see the end of our own, or of the cosmos to make a certain judgment, as Kant would say: knowledge is judgment... In any event, whether one considers finite knowledge alone, or with infinte quasi forms representing spiritual knowledge these forms exist within us, within our culture, and so long as we exist as meanings....

What all forms have in common is meaning... Finite physical forms have a being with a meaning... What quasi moral forms have is meaning only... Ask yourself: Will a man's meaning when he says: Justice, live on after he dies??? Since all knowledge of reality exists within humanity as certain meanings; will they exist apart from humanity when humanity is gone???...

I have known people who talked almost their entire lives who after having a stroke could laugh, or cry, but speak no words...Perhaps if they can still conceive of something they could find a means of relating it, but with their loss of words they are denied one of the tools of thought, and most of the means of communication... If it is possible that in some part of their brain they could hear speech as Socrates heard his Deamon, then he might think words exist; but what could he say if words were totally lost to him??? What if life were lost to him???

You see, things exist without our knowledge as germs once existed, and though they had the power to kill they had no meaning, and because they had no meaning we had no power over them... It was not their meaning that brought them into existence, but their meaning which made them real...

I know it is a fine point, but from our standpoint, our perspective, being is a secondary question to meaning because knowledge does not exist as an abstraction... Some people do not like morals because it is impossible to abstract them... Every conscious choice can be framed as a moral choice...

Frank; the choice to believe that all of reality exists apart from our humanity to witness it rests on its creation and witnessing by a higher power, a God... And our saying it exists, and God exists apart from humanity is really a denial of the ability and greatness of human life that can almost bring things into reality with a thought, and we do so everytime we take an idea like Justice and make from it a social form like Law... To me, the only question of being that is valid is of our own being because it is upon our being that our perception of reality exists... Life is meaning, and it is living humanity that decides the meaning and value of all things...We do not hold the scales... We are the scales...

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@fresco,

Are you actually reduced to jibes...rather than discussion, Fresco.

Why not respond to the issues raised?

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Reality from the view point of theists

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