Question: can the play Macbeth be destroyed? Theoretically, we could destroy every copy of Macbeth, be it on paper, film, or stored on a computer. And theoretically, we could wait a few centuries until humanity had lost all memory of the play. But would that mean Macbeth was destroyed? Can a thought (or the sequence of thoughts and images which constitute the play Macbeth) ever be destroyed? — Art48

Well what is the fundamental lesson or meaning underpinning macbeth?

I believe it is "self fullfilling prophecy". Someone tells you you will be bestowed with kingly power. You then live by that expectation which leads you to take that power thus fullfilling what was predicted. But because you demanded and took power (based on expecting it) rather than asking for it, you're filled with guilt/shame that fuels paranoia as to whether you deserved it in the first place. So desperate to justify yourself and the prophecy you have witnessed to be true, you commit more atrocities to maintain that power.

The message is then that power cannot be demanded it can only be asked for. This is the foundation of democracy.

Macbeth is a story of the justness of democracy over the injustice of tyranny. I believe that fundamental basis is true for all of time. Thus Shakespeare did indeed extract from a universal mindscape. He brought to the forefront of human thought an innate truth regarding dealing with authority.

"authority is not owed to you, you must earn it".

I hope this answers your question. If not feel free to elaborate further.

Benj96,

I used Macbeth as an example of a thought (or rather a collection of related thoughts).
My question is really: does it make sense to regard thoughts a pre-existing? - just as we regard things in the landscape (rocks, trees, etc.) as pre-existing.

I used Macbeth as an example of a thought (or rather a collection of related thoughts).
My question is really: does it make sense to regard thoughts a pre-existing? - just as we regard things in the landscape (rocks, trees, etc.) as pre-existing. — Art48

Yes I think so. I think thought about what can exist and that which does exist emerge simultaneously as opposites. The subject (the observer/believer) MUST emerge simultaneously with that which is observed/believed by the subject (the objective world).

It doesn't make sense to have a reality that is objectified/objective - that which is observed and acknowledged, without a subject which has the ability to observe them.

We use science to standardise, measure and objectify the universe relative to us. And we use faith/belief/spiritual to identify ourselves, our consciousness, in an objective, a physical world..

We have belief, we have imagination, creativity, possibility (all the same thing going by different names) until we observe and that waveform is collapsed into particulate defined things - (wave-particle duality) as is exemplified by quantum physics.

We CANNOT remove ourselves, our own awareness, from that which is observed. "Subjective experience" and "objectively experienced" are mutually dependent on one another. We can't deny the universes ability to be conscious of itself as we are the part of the universe that is so.

We are "order", we are "negentropy" processing and interpreting "disorder" or "entropy" around us. Without this processing, without this sense and determination of things, the external universe would be nonsensical, would lack coherence, would lack logic.

I hope i answered your question. If not please let me know and we can continue our discourse.

The common view is that if I walk in the forest and see a tree, the tree was pre-existent; it existed before I saw it. — Art48

It's not merely 'the common view'; it is a necessity. If the tree were not there when you arrived, you would not be able to see it. It takes rather a long time for a tree to be built up from its constituent molecules, whether you happen to walk by or not; and in fact, there had to exist quite a lot of vegetation before a mammal with eyes was even possible.
We know this as fact --- unless we throw out all knowledge of science, all experience of physical reality, and start from a non-rational mind-set to construct a theoretical reality.

A view contrary to the common view is that just as the tree is a pre-existent part of the landscape, Macbeth is a pre-existent part of the mindscape. — Art48

Just as the tree is a part of that forest, it grew over many years from the soil and water and sunshine of that specific landscape. It pre-exists your sight of it, not the germination of its acorn. So, too, the play Macbeth became a part of Shakespeare's mindscape on the night he finished writing it - after however long it to took to grow there from its constituent words from his fertile imagination, watered by his creative use of language. It pre-exists your witnessing of it; not Shakespeare's concept of it.

And theoretically, we could wait a few centuries until humanity had lost all memory of the play. — Art48

Yes, it would. A great many creative works have been destroyed in human history; you and I cannot know what they were like. There will come a time when nobody knows the play Macbeth. And there comes a time when the tree is cut down and burned, or falls down and decomposes. They both return their constituent elements to the environment; one to the culture, the other to the ecosystem.

If a thought can be destroyed — Art48

A play is far more than a single thought; it is the culmination of many hours of thinking, after many years of experience and interaction with other people and learning. Thoughts are ephemeral. A thought doesn't need to be destroyed in order to cease existing: a thought is almost instantly subsumed by an idea, a conjecture, a stream of consciousness; it's swept away by impressions, sensations, other thoughts; it's dispelled by distraction and conversation and sleep. A thought is eradicated almost the second of its inception.

I'd say our experience of a thought is transitory, as is our experience of a tree. But I think the view that the thought existed before it entered our mind and exists after it leaves our mind is defensible and may in fact be true.

I'd say our experience of a thought is transitory, as is our experience of a tree. But I think the view that the thought existed before it entered our mind and exists after it leaves our mind is defensible and may in fact be true. — Art48

What/who generated it? What is it made of? How does it differ from sensory input and experience? How does it travel? Whence did it arrive to your mind? Who owns it before and after the arrival? By what mechanism is it apprehended? Where does it go when it departs? Does it flit from head to head like a butterfly on flowers? Does it change shape en route from one mind to another? Why do we not routinely use telepathy?
If the notion that thoughts exist independently of minds is defensible, I have not seen or heard it credibly defended.

Potential?

"cogito, ergo i erit"?

In a nutshell, this view says just as the physical world is given, the mental and emotional worlds are given. We choose to go to places in the physical world (New York, Rome, etc.) and we can choose to go to places in the mental world (calculus, group theory, etc.). Einstein was like an explorer who first found his way to the part of the mental universe where the thoughts that constitute the theory of relativity reside. Now, graduate students routinely travel to the same place.

Vera Mont: If the notion that thoughts exist independently of minds is defensible, I have not seen or heard it credibly defended.
Most mathematicians subscribe to Mathematical Platonism, which says math is discovered, not invented. I’d say math consists of thoughts, thoughts such as there is no largest prime number, the square root of two cannot be expressed as a fraction, etc. For something to be discovered, it must pre-exist. So, arguments for Mathematical Platonism implicitly argue that math thoughts are pre-existent.

Vera Mont: What/who generated it?
Unknown. Just as what/who generated the big bang is unknown or what/who made it so that there is no largest prime number.

Vera Mont: What is it made of?
What is thought made of? I don’t know.

Vera Mont: How does it differ from sensory input and experience?
Under this view, thought (and emotion) is sensory input and experience.
The body processes physical sensation.
The mind processes mental sensation.
Another faculty (let’s call it “the heart”) processes emotional sensation.

Most mathematicians subscribe to Mathematical Platonism, which says math is discovered, not invented. — Art48

Yes, I've heard it, but I think it refers to quantities and ratios that reside in physical reality and make the orderly interaction of elements possible - else, no stable structure could exist. I do not believe it refers to measurements and equations but to the quantities and relationships we express as measurements and equations.

I’d say math consists of thoughts, thoughts such as there is no largest prime number, the square root of two cannot be expressed as a fraction, etc.

Those thoughts are the observation (possibly accurate, though non-existence is hard to prove) of pre-existing phenomena. It is the phenomena that are discovered; the thoughts are responses by a human mind. An alien mind might think quite differently about them; a shark's mind not discover them at all, nor miss them.

Under this view, thought (and emotion) is sensory input and experience. — Art48

Then why do not all the people with similar reception equipment apprehend all these thoughts, the same as they would all feel heat or wetness? A fair percentage of the human population thinks no more about the square root of 2 than do sharks, and hardly any pluck Macbeth out of the ether.

The notion seems to leave too many unknown factors unaccounted for to qualify as a defensible theory. I'd demote it to speculation or proposition.

Mathematical Platonism refers to the entities of mathematics: groups, ring, fields, vector spaces, topologies, p-adic numbers, etc., etc., not merely to quantities and ratios.

It is the phenomena that are discovered; the thoughts are responses by a human mind. — Vera Mont

No. For instance, non-Euclidean spaces were discovered decades before they were used in the general theory of relativity. And I'm aware of no phenomena corresponding to the fact that the square root of 2 is not equal to a fraction.

Then why do not all the people with similar reception equipment apprehend all these thoughts, the same as they would all feel heat or wetness? A fair percentage of the human population thinks no more about the square root of 2 than do sharks, and hardly any pluck Macbeth out of the ether. — Vera Mont

For the same reason, some people travel to Rome but many do not. The landscape and mindscape are vast; people only live in a small part of each.

Ho-kay....

If a thought can be destroyed, then perhaps Shakespeare did create the play Macbeth. But if we find it difficult to imagine utterly destroying a thought, then perhaps we’ll also find it difficult to believe that a mere human could create an eternal, indestructible thought, or the sequence of thoughts and images which constitute the play Macbeth. — Art48

As to whether a thought can be destroyed, I do not assume that it can. I base this statement on a sort of "living Universe" paradigm, a sort of Animistic perspective. Wherein thoughts are similar to living creatures, but of an "energetic" kind. Implying that (to some degree) the brain is a receiver. This also implies that thoughts can never be created or destroyed, only transformed.

Ideas represent objects. An idea doesn't exist, it refers to something that exists. If nothing existed no idea could exist. The mindscape is the world of objects. Macbeth is an exact arrangement of words, but the idea of Macbeth is political in nature. If Macbeth was destroyed, as long as there are people engaged in politics the idea of Macbeth will exist. However, I don't think ideas *actually* exist, such as that the world is composed of ideas. Ideas are one of the most difficult things to think on, regarding how they are experienced by consciousness and how they are formed. I think they are the result of cooperating brain functions and the idea we experience like our perception of the world is just a vivid sensation.

Macbeth is an exact arrangement of words, but the idea of Macbeth is political in nature. — introbert

A view contrary to the common view is that just as the tree is a pre-existent part of the landscape, Macbeth is a pre-existent part of the mindscape. Shakespeare saw the play in the mindscape and recorded it. (This is not to diminish Shakespeare’s accomplishment no more than we diminish the accomplishment of finding gold in the ground, or finding a child lost in a forest.) — Art48

But Shakespeare's Macbeth is based on a real historical character. Most of Shakespeare's characters are. His stories are informed by actual historical events, so they are 'interpretations' and embellishments and are based on drammatic license. I dont see how such connects to concepts of 'pre-existent thought.'

From wiki:
Macbeth (Medieval Gaelic: Mac Bethad mac Findlaích; Modern Scottish Gaelic: MacBheatha mac Fhionnlaigh; English: Macbeth son of Findlay, nicknamed Rí Deircc, "the Red King"; c. 1005 – 15 August 1057) was King of Scots from 1040 until his death. He ruled over the Kingdom of Alba, which covered only a portion of present-day Scotland.

I can see how “pre-existent” is controversial but do you agree Macbeth is a sequence of thoughts and images? If not, then what is it? A sequence of sentences on paper? But Macbeth can be translated into French. Besides, if every paper copy of Macbeth were destroyed, the play would still exist? Agree? Then, still exist as what? A sequence of thoughts and images is the only answer I can find.

As to whether thoughts pre-exist, that’s the question posed in the original post.