Ah, but surely you believe that feeling and sensation are more than the concept we need to speak about them?Regarding the sensuous, I don't believe anything is non-conceptually "there"; primordially or otherwise. As far as I can see it can be 'there' only in that good old empty formal way of the noumenal. — John
Continuing the above, how could truth be a serious matter if you didn't feel something about truth. We're aren't (only) word computers.You and I apparently see things very differently when it comes to the pursuit of truth. I think it is a deadly serious matter; whereas you seem to understand it only in terms of the self-images of heroism and the mirage of glamour. A kind of celebrity view of the spiritual quest; it seems to me to be. — John
Ah, but surely you believe that feeling and sensation are more than the concept we need to speak about them? — Hoo
And I have to though this one in:since feeling is first
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world
my blood approves,
and kisses are better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don't cry
—the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids' flutter which says
we are for each other: then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life's not a paragraph
And death i think is no parenthesis — cummings
Me up at does
out of the floor
quietly Stare
a poisoned mouse
still who alive
is asking What
have i done that
You wouldn’t have — cummings
I think that the transcendent has its basis in the experience of the transcendent, which isn't altogether uncommon. A beautiful piece of art, falling and being in love, prayer/meditation, values, meaning, etc. - there's lots of possibilities out there for encountering the transcendent. As for why we are attracted to the transcendent - I think Plato was right, and we are a sort of a metaxy - an in-between the world and the transcendent - we have one foot in this world, and another in the world of spirit. So you are right - we can never know the transcendent. But we are still attracted to it, we want to experience it, and be around it. It's part of our nature. Hence we desire to know it, even though we can't ever know it - we are always attached to the Earth. "Significance" that you are talking about, that is merely a feeling, I don't think it's such a thing as a fact. So I'm not sure about the quest for profound significance underlying an intellectual movement - maybe it is the opposite in fact - in front of the transcendent, man is indeed like nothing. — Agustino
The experience doesn't seem to be situated in the physical world as I understand it. Some things in the physical world do give rise to, or lead to the experience, that is true, but the experience isn't of something situated anywhere in the world. I look at a beautiful painting, and behold, for a moment I am transfigured, experience the slowing down of time, the forgetfulness of a strong sense of self and the nearby world - and instead I become focused not on the painting itself, but on that which the painting expresses. You can search for the source of that experience anywhere you want in the atomic configuration of the painting and you will not find it.The examples you use all describe what takes place in the world (the universe) so I'm not sure we're using "transcendent" in the same way. — Ciceronianus the White
I think Plato himself though was quite an artist - I find his dialogues sublime. Plato disliked artists because he understood how art can be misused to encourage base desires, instead of pursuit of the good. And there were some philosophers who found art to be very significant - such as Schopenhauer.I wonder if this accounts for Plato's dislike of artists. — Ciceronianus the White
Very well - I fail to see how this can account for the vast variety of content of the world, which escapes the physical. For me, the transcendent is clearly part of our experience. We experience the transcendent. Meaning is transcendent for example - nowhere in the purely physical will you find any meaning. — Agustino
Probably.Perhaps we mean different things by "transcendent." — Ciceronianus the White
My only problem with that is that the Universe generally has the connotation of being the sum of everything that physics can account for - and I don't think this includes the whole of existence.For me, what is in and takes place in the universe is not transcendent. — Ciceronianus the White
If you define "world" as the whole of existence sure.We can have no idea of the truly transcendent because we can have no idea which doesn't arise from living in the world, as part of the world. — Ciceronianus the White
I and I are, yes. (Which doesn't mean I'm Jamaican. Rather I at T1 and I and T2.) — Terrapin Station
That issue has always struck me as one of those "invent-a-problems."How do you account for similarity and difference if not by universals. — darthbarracuda
But what makes it the case that they are similar, — darthbarracuda
Just from wikipedia: "In logic, extensionality, or extensional equality, refers to principles that judge objects to be equal if they have the same external properties."
But I think universals provide a much more useful and appealing theory, especially when it comes to causation.
In the example you give, for example, % one has a circle to the left of a slanted line as does %, while that's not the case for and @. They're not numerically identical circles--obviously, which makes them not identical. It's simply (degree of) resemblance.
Why would you think that o and o are circles by instantiating a numerically identical property of circularity that exists who knows where and that obtains in those circles by who knows what means so that it's just ONE circularity property even though we're talking about two different things? That's just incoherent. It's reifying the fact that we make mental type abstractions. — Terrapin Station
That's complete nonsense. The idea that either there's some abstractly existing, numerically identical property that's somehow instantiated in multiple things, or resemblance is "random" simply makes zero sense.Because without universals similarity or resemblance becomes arbitrary. — darthbarracuda
There are indeed multiple different things - they are numerically different but not qualitatively different.
When you say something is round, why is it round?
Without universals, there cannot be any explanation as to why two properties happen to be identical in nature. — darthbarracuda
Two things are round - without universals there doesn't seem to be any way to explain why these two things are both identified as being round.
Without universals, the world becomes totally disorganized and messy. — darthbarracuda
That's complete nonsense. The idea that either there's some abstractly existing, numerically identical property that's somehow instantiated in multiple things, or resemblance is "random" simply makes zero sense. — Terrapin Station
Re there being a "reason for the ways things are," that's the case with universals, too. No matter how many reasons you give behind something, no matter what it is, you get to a point where "it's just the way things are." You can't keep giving an infinity of reasons one step back and then another step back and then another step back, etc., right? — Terrapin Station
What's incoherent is saying that they're not numerically different in terms of the quality or properties. And you have to be saying that the properties in questino are numerically identical or you're not talking about universals. You'd be a nominalist then instead. — Terrapin Station
You don't need an explanation for that because no two properties are literally identical. Again, you'd simply be reifying type abstractions that we make. Reifying conceptual categories we create as individuals in our minds. — Terrapin Station
It couldn't be more simple. They both meet your criteria, you mental, conceptual abstraction, for calling them "round" things. — Terrapin Station
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