Hey Guys, this is my first post here - I wanted an outlet for my thoughts to be openly critiqued and challenged - posted below are my thoughts on language, existence, and the arbitrariness of objects. While I appreciate references to philosophers, I would really appreciate if you would also describe what they have to say about my theories themselves. Finally, thank you for taking the time to read my post, and enjoy!

Without a perceiving and experiencing body, the boundaries between individual objects disappear. For instance, my sense of touch allows me to perceive a table as a physical object distinct from its surrounding, since the material sensation of feeling that table feels different from the air around it. Similarly, if my only sense was a sense of smell my perception of the world would be purely of different scents, and without a sense of touch or sight the idea of “direction” would not exist – I would only be able to individuate or draw boundaries around certain smells and mark them as distinct from one another.

However, it is clear to see that these boundaries marked by our perception are not absolute, but instead arbitrary products of our perception. There is no “actual” such thing as a table in terms of absolute, physical terms: all physical objects are simply an arrangement of atoms/quarks, and the individuating of the object occurs when an individual perceives an arbitrary collection of these quantum objects as a distinct thing in and of itself. I will illustrate this point with a brief thought experiment.

What is this an image of?



It appears fairly obvious that pictured here are an apple and an orange. But consider this: a term used to describe specifically an apple and an orange together – an applorange. This new conception may appear fairly ridiculous at first and you may say that it is indeed not and applorange because I’ve just made it up, but the creation of this concept in my mind is one just as arbitrary as any object inn any mind – in the same way that the object on the right to you is “obviously” an apple, the conception of these two things together can just as obviously be an applorange to me. Furthermore, in disagreements about whether this thing is indeed an applorange or simply an apple and an orange the arbitrariness of these boundaries become even more apparent: neither side has the authority to say that their individuation of these boundaries are the “correct” one, because they are both truthfully perceiving the above image in the way that they describe it. The applorange did not exist before we conceptualised it, and in the same way if there were no perceiving beings, the boundaries surrounding commonly understood terms such as “trees” and “books” are completely dissolved and the individuation of the “tree” and the “book”, along with their existence itself, ceases to exist.

So far, I have explored the abstract way in which these physical objects are individuated. However, it is now a short leap to conclude that the boundaries around any concept, even abstract ones such as happiness or existence itself are just as groundless and subjective.

Our understanding of what it means to be, and what it means to exist are coloured by our perception of things: most basically, perhaps, by the simple observation of presence and absence which is the most basic foundation of perception – something is perceived, and it is present, and when it is not perceived, it is absent. But isn’t the perception of presence and absence as arbitrary as the things which are present and absent? The fact that my individuation of something as a distinct “thing” is completely arbitrary, means that the “presence” or “absence” of that thing is already a moot point: that “thing” as an individual concept does not exist outside of my perception to be present or absent in the first place.

Thus, even the idea that something can be is not a fact of the universe. If beings did not perceive, then there would not be a conception of what it means to be, and it would in fact be false to say that anything exists, absolutely, outside of any perceiving being.