I don't know what it means that "they are interpretations of us having (in some ways) separate bodies". — Noble Dust

Why do we put bodies in separate graves, under individualized headstones? Why is the rule or custom one soul per body? Why not some other number? Or an undetermined number?

I'm not complaining and hopefully not insane but just trying to point out what is 'too' obvious, which is the dominance of the concept/custom of the isolated soul or mind.

Starting from this dead poem, we get all kinds of philosophy that takes it for granted. Again, I'm not objecting, but only pointing at dominant dead poetry that functions as a context for live poetry. I mean complex debates about the relationship of an internal world (if any) and an external (if any) and their complex relationship (if any.)

Where are all the debates about how many egos per skull?

Why not 'we think therefore we are'? How did Descartes know there was only one of him in there, if his body (assumed singular) might be an illusion?

Habits of interpretation are (mis-)taken for bedrock, for super-facts, for the screen on which a world is projected.

Carlyle had me at the word "tawdry" :sweat:

But I would recommend Barfield's "Poetic Diction" on this topic; i.e. dead metaphors.

Eh I feel like you're trying to play into me saying I'm a poet.

I found a Barfield quote that speaks to me:

Yeah, I'll have to read more.
******
Language has preserved for us the inner, living history of man's soul. It reveals the evolution of consciousness.

Eh I feel like you're trying to play into me saying I'm a poet. — Noble Dust

Actually I want to convince you that you are a poem.

'Noble dust' is a nice name, btw, so maybe I am half way there.

Nice! That's a decent little encapsulation of some of his thought.

Actually I want to convince you that you are a poem. — Yellow Horse

Sure, go ahead.

Sure, go ahead. — Noble Dust

Really I'm repeating an old idea, that identity is a 'fiction' (or useful hypothesis).

I'm fairly Wittgensteinian when it comes to meaning, so I think meaning is 'public' and 'between us' rather than 'inside' --despite relating to the natural-by-custom intuitions otherwise.

So identity is a kind of enacted largely linguistic pattern, unified by custom and a proper name.

I found a pdf of Barfield's poetic diction. I am also fishing a quotes page. Here are some goodies.


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The obvious is the hardest thing of all to point out to anyone who has genuinely lost sight of it.
...
We can only cope with the dangers of language if we recognize that language is by nature magical and therefore highly dangerous.
...
If people say the world we perceive is a 'construct' of our brains, they are saying in effect, that it results from an inveterate habit of thought.
...
Before the scientific revolution, [man] did not feel himself isolated by his skin from the world outside to quite the same extent that we do.
...
Therefore it is only people living in the same period and, broadly speaking, in the same community, who inhabit the same world. People living in other periods, or even at the same period but in a totally different community, do not inhabit the same world about which they have different ideas, they inhabit different worlds altogether.
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The first quote echoes Heraclitus. Others remind me of Wittgenstein.

To me it seems that sharing a language is sharing a world (if imperfectly, given that the world is a self-writing poem-in-progress, with our help.)

On the God issue, I think it's helpful to clarify (however roughly) between a God that interferes in the world and perhaps the afterworld and a philosopher's or mystic's God that involves gnosis, ecstasy, etc.

I don't personally believe in the first kind of God. The year 2020 is not helping, and humans tend to get lost in their fantasies. — Yellow Horse

I wrote what, to me, seemed a hugely significant essay in my twenties, called 'God is not God'. The point of the essay was, in short, that what we refer to or think of when we use that name, is nearly always a social convention or collective idea comprising layers of meaning that have been built up over centuries. That was what I had in mind.

At the time, I was exploring the path of mystical syncretism through various readings and encounters with spiritual teachers. I was deeply persuaded by what is sometimes called, very prosaically, the Way of Negation. I know that if I try and explain it, it will fall flat, but the inspiration for it at the time was Krishnamurti and my readings of popular books about Zen. Another figure that I found deeply moving was Ramana Maharishi, died 1960, who was the inspiration for Somerset Maugham's book The Razor's Edge (turned into a very ordinary film by Bill Murray).

So the upshot of all that was that I came to the view that what a lot of people mean by 'God' is actually a version of Jupiter, to all intents - rather like Father Christmas, albeit at a cosmic scale. It seems to me, anyway, what many believers accept, and what many atheists reject. So, if that's what you have in mind, then I probably agree; I suppose most regular Christians would probably consider me atheist, and in their terms, it's probably true. But the thing is, I simply will never be persuaded by any form of materialism, and I believe that scientific naturalism is incapable of reaching an ultimate truth, on the grounds of its constitution. To reach that, requires what the sages describe as 'realisation'. So I guess, at the end of the day, I'm still on the religious side of the ledger, although I rather hope more towards the gnostic end of that scale.

Where we perhaps disagree is that I think you understand some of these patterns to exist independently of human beings. — Yellow Horse

I cannot prove scientifically that Truth must be conceived as a Truth that is valid independent of humanity; but I believe it firmly. I believe, for instance, that the Pythagorean theorem in geometry states something that is approximately true, independent of the existence of man. — Albert Einstein

I agree with Einstein, although I think his 'approximately' is an unwarranted caveat. BUT, what I genuinely think that Einstein, genius that he was, overlooked, is that the Pythagorean theorem, though it is certainly not dependent on anyone's knowing of it, can nevertheless only be grasped by a rational intelligence. And it's the same with all such principles, laws and the like; they're only perceptible to reason, but they're real. So mind-independent, in one sense, but only perceivable by a mind. That, I think, is what is meant by objective (as distinct from subjective) idealism (and interestingly, C S Peirce is often cited as a representative of that general stance.)

Therefore it is only people living in the same period and, broadly speaking, in the same community, who inhabit the same world. People living in other periods, or even at the same period but in a totally different community, do not inhabit the same world about which they have different ideas, they inhabit different worlds altogether. — Yellow Horse, quoting Owen Barfield

This is one of the insights that Barfield is known for. I think it's profoundly true, and hardly ever understood. 'The past is foreign country - they do things differently there' ~ L.P. Hartley, The Go Between.

This is one of the insights that Barfield is known for. — Wayfarer

For me they live in the same world largely because they live together in as the language of that time and place. Language just is the intelligible structure of the world, I suggest, and the rational minds thought needed to grasp that structure are themselves 'more language.'

'Language speaks the subject' and the ego is an effect not of the world it gazes at but the world from which it emerges with/as an illusory sense of its isolation. Or that's an idea I like.

they're only perceptible to reason, but they're real. — Wayfarer

I'd say that they are reason and agree that they are real, and that the word real has not two meanings but rather too many meanings (as many as we want.)

The point of the essay was, in short, that what we refer to or think of when we use that name, is nearly always a social convention or collective idea comprising layers of meaning that have been built up over centuries. — Wayfarer

I suspect that thinking in general is like this. At our best we can think (in our inherited conventional language) against social conventions like meanings, but only by using them as we do so, else we would not be intelligible.

So I guess, at the end of the day, I'm still on the religious side of the ledger, although I rather hope more towards the gnostic end of that scale. — Wayfarer

I call myself an atheist as the least wrong summary, but a less wrong summary is referring to Sartor Resartus.

If I have a religion, it's something like philosophy...which is it to say perhaps endlessly a work-in-progress.

Language just is the intelligible structure of the world, I suggest, and the rational minds thought needed to grasp that structure are themselves 'more language.' — Yellow Horse

The problem is, that doesn't allow for anything other than language - no referent, nothing beyond words. So the intelligibility of the world is not dependent on language - it's more that when h. sapiens evolves to the point of being able to speak and count, then she has the intellectual tools to discover that intelligible nature. So we do differ on that. But I think the classical idea of intelligibility that I keep harking back to, is now regarded as an anachronism or anthropomorphism.

But in any case, humanity's 'sphere of the knowable' has continually changed, morphed and grown, and not only by dint of speaking or language.

I am intending to get hold of the recent bio of Paul Dirac - this one. One of the things Dirac was known for was being taciturn in the extreme 'This Dirac' said Bohr, 'he seems to know a lot of physics, but he never says anything.' I'm fascinated by the fact he predicted anti-matter because it 'fell out of the equations' but that its existence was only confirmed much later. That, to me, again, is more evidence of the power of reason, and it's certainly not simply a matter of language, seems to me.

I believe that scientific naturalism is incapable of reaching an ultimate truth, on the grounds of its constitution. To reach that, requires what the sages describe as 'realisation'. — Wayfarer

Emptiness is the ultimate truth? Not much practical value, you must admit, other than stress relief and perhaps something to build a religion around.

The problem is, that doesn't allow for anything other than language - no referent, nothing beyond words. — Wayfarer

Perhaps it doesn't allow for any thing (in its thingness) apart from language. If one casts language as the (intelligible) structure of the world, this is not to say that the world is just language.

It is perhaps to drop the notion of the chair-in-itself hidden somehow behind the chair we talk about.

The word qualia 'wants' to point at something 'outside' language (and so also outside objectivity).

We might think of language as the skeleton of the world and sensation/emotion as its flesh.

I'm fascinated by the fact he predicted anti-matter because it 'fell out of the equations' but that its existence was only confirmed much later. That, to me, again, is more evidence of the power of reason, and it's certainly not simply a matter of language, seems to me. — Wayfarer

I will try to account for this from my POV.

To predict anti-matter is to voice an expectation that certain statements involving 'anti-matter' will become facts (to present a fact candidate).

Reason looks like a useful reification, but then that's what language does: it reifies, carves the 'One' into the many.

To predict anti-matter is to voice an expectation that certain statements involving 'anti-matter' will become facts (to present a fact candidate). — Yellow Horse

It discloses new knowledge; it facilitates discovery - that is just what the word means, 'uncovering' something previously not seen. It provides insight into nature.

Emptiness is the ultimate truth? — praxis

Nāgārjuna denies that śūnyatā is 'ultimate truth'. That is a reification. But I've long learned that discussions of śūnyatā on internet forums is a hamster wheel.

As far as I'm aware, "realization" in Buddhism (the perspective that I assume you believe in) refers to the realization of emptiness, so what other ultimate truth do you think is realizable? Oh, I see, anything that you might say would be a reification so, once again, you've been rendered silent. "He who knows does not speak" and all that funky jazz. Cool, super cool. :cool:

If one looks at that funky jazz objectively, the reason why those sages taught silence and stillness, was because it was a meditative technique with the aim of developing a state of mind, body and the various spiritual states of consciousness. It wasn't because the answers of the universe were nothing, or unspeakable, unknowable etc.

I can't speak for Bhuddism, but there was always to be found within the various traditions a core of esoteric knowledge of the make up of the heavens and the origins of existence. But it was not taught to the average follower because it would become a distraction and was only really intelligible to the initiated anyway.

Also, to the initiated there was generally an understanding that there were ultimate truths, or narratives, but that they were unintelligible until certain exalted states had been achieved, if at all.

If one looks at that funky jazz objectively, the reason why those sages taught silence and stillness, was because it was a meditative technique with the aim of developing a state of mind, body and the various spiritual states of consciousness. It wasn't because the answers of the universe were nothing, or unspeakable, unknowable etc. — Punshhh

You’re right, it’s rather uncool of the wayfarer to hypocritically reify the ultimate truth.

to the initiated there was generally an understanding that there were ultimate truths, or narratives, but that they were unintelligible until certain exalted states had been achieved, if at all. — Punshhh

This is an essential aspect of religion. After all, what good is a religion that doesn’t promise ultimate truth? And just as significantly, what good is a religion that delivers it? Zero, on both counts, because the point is social cohesion via social hierarchy. Worse is that religion doesn’t actually promote the development of virtue because that leads to independence from the group and hierarchy.

You’re right, it’s rather uncool of the wayfarer to hypocritically reify the ultimate truth.

I don't think he was doing that, it's not my place to say what he was saying though.

This is an essential aspect of religion. After all, what good is a religion that doesn’t promise ultimate truth? And just as significantly, what good is a religion that delivers it? Zero, on both counts, because the point is social cohesion via social hierarchy. Worse is that religion doesn’t actually promote the development of virtue because that leads to independence from the group and hierarchy.

Yes, although I was referring to the esoteric schools. They were though, part and parcel of the system as you describe it.

Ultimate truth is the worst thing one could reify, in my opinion.

Btw, I didn’t recognize you with the Frida avatar until just now when your thoughts/manner felt familiar.

To start with, the definition of God as the source of all contingent things is sufficient for 'belief in God' and sufficient for a simple definition of God.

As for pure atheism, I don't think it can be defended. We are not in a position to say 'God does not exist'. Such a position, I believe, cannot be defended. Ultimately, agnosticism is the only non theist position.

We are not in a position to say 'God does not exist'. — EnPassant

The problem with this is that it follows we're not in a position to say that anything at all does not exist. Because no one is going to say that whatever is manifestly in-itself existing does not exist, that leaves only those things which do not manifestly in-themselves exist that are subject to this conjectural existence. That's a lot of things. God has a lot of company - with an exactly equal claim to existence. Flying hippopotami in every color in the rainbow with MAGA hats, and the same without MAGA hats. And that's just the hippopotami.

But it seems this must be nonsensical. The way out is to stop making nonsense.

To start with, the definition of God as the source of all contingent things is sufficient for 'belief in God' and sufficient for a simple definition of God. — EnPassant

What is each contingent thing has as its source some other contingent thing, such that there are no non-contingent things? What then is God?

And even if there did have to be some necessary thing that was the source of all contingent things, that could just be some event like the Big Bang. If the Big Bang turns out to be the source of all contingent things, and is not a person or in any way at all like a mythical deity, just some impersonal cosmic event, would you call that "God"? I don't think many would.

God has a lot of company - with an exactly equal claim to existence. Flying hippopotami — tim wood

That is only true for non theists. Theists would disagree. So flat-out atheism must assert theists are misguided/deluded and that claim cannot be convincingly defended. Also, things can be argued to exist through pure reason, without general experience of those things. For example, sub atomic particles can be discovered through mathematical physics. Black holes and other astronomical bodies can be deduced to exist by reason alone (black holes were predicted long before they were an empirical reality). The pure atheist cannot reason in the opposite way and declare that God does not exist.

If the Big Bang turns out to be the source of all contingent things, and is not a person or in any way at all like a mythical deity, just some impersonal cosmic event, would you call that "God"? — Pfhorrest

But the big bang must be contingent. You have to go back further, into eternity, the get to the source.

God has a lot of company - with an exactly equal claim to existence. Flying hippopotami
— tim wood
That is only true for non theists. — EnPassant

Eh? You affirm truth and then deny the same truth you affirm. In kindest terms that's crazy-making.

Theists would disagree. — EnPassant

On what grounds?

So flat-out atheism must assert theists are misguided/deluded and that claim cannot be convincingly defended. — EnPassant

"Flat-out" I wouldn't know. And theists assert claims that not only are unsupported but that are in principle unsupportable. So yes, to the degree claimed misguided/deluded, Except this: if it's a Christian God we're talking about, there is an entire history you apparently are not even aware of the possibility of, and, Christians profess their creed in the "We believe...". Never in the sense, "God exists."

But there are plenty of supernaturalist fundamentalists who claim both to be Christian and that God exists, a heretical mistake that horrifies real Christians. And why do the fundamentalists do it? Because they're ignorant, uneducated, and most important, somebody sold them the idea for ready cash and having bought it, they will not acknowledge its worthlessness.

The pure atheist cannot reason in the opposite way and declare that God does not exist. — EnPassant

Again, I don't know about the pure, but as to reason, you need only inform yourself as to the nature of God as developed over a few thousand years by some very heavy and heavily interested thinkers. They reasoned, in brief, that God is unknowable. And that makes sense, because if you want to believe in an all-whatever being, then he/she/it/they cannot be delimited by what can be known about them.

And Kant, who denied knowledge to make room for faith. The claim, then, that God exists is for oh, so many reasons an exhibition of ignorance at the very best. Or maybe you're one of those salesmen, or bought from one.

But the big bang must be contingent. — EnPassant

Must it? Explain.

You have to go back further, into eternity, the get to the source. — EnPassant

So in an account where there was some eternally existing "primeval atom" that then spontaneously exploded into the whole universe as we know it, you'd be willing to call that primeval atom "God"? That's the original account of the Big Bang (no longer current in physical cosmology).

Or does the eternal thing have to be forward-eternal too? In that case, if it were proven that there was some kind of boring simple physical thing that had always existed, had done something like smash into an eternally-existing space-time to transform it into the universe as we know it, and continued to exist somewhere out there beyond our space-time now, would you call that "God"?

Or how about the most contemporary account of physical cosmology, eternal inflation, in where there is an eternal and infinite quantum field, the inflaton field, that goes on existing even now and will exist forever, that on occasion spontaneously shifts in one spot to a different phase resulting in what we perceive as a Big Bang, which is actually a much much much more slowly-expanding little bubble in the still-expanding spacetime mostly still occupied by the inflaton field. Is the inflaton field "God" on your account?

What I'm getting at here is whether you're okay with the notion of a God that is not a person, that doesn't have thoughts or feelings or wills, that can't hear prayers or issue commands, or judge souls after death, etc. It's just some thing that kicked off existence, and nothing more. Is that really enough to count as "God" to you?

Because I expect it's not to most theists, who are not theists because they were convinced by faulty metaphysical arguments that there must exist some boring piece of metaphysical machinery to enable the existence of the ordinary universe, but rather were charmed by childhood stories of a loving powerful being who's watching out for them.

Black holes and other astronomical bodies can be deduced to exist by reason alone

Um, no. The existence of black holes was deduced as a theoretical consequence of the theory of relativity- as a valid solution to the relativistic field equations for catastrophic gravitational collapse of massive bodies- a theory about the physical world that had been confirmed observationally. This deduction could only be interpreted as a claim about the physical world (rather than merely about the consequences of a particular mathematical construction) once relativity had been empirically corroborated. As always and as we've known for quite some time, reason alone can never establish any non-trivial existence claims, and so there is no asymmetry here between the theist and the atheist. Which is of course why all the various forms of the ontological argument are such complete failures. You can never tell what exists in the world, without looking at the world to find out (and unfortunately, theism fares no better in that regard either, which is why theism is untenable on any rational or empirical basis, and so is only held as a matter of faith).