:up:

Thomism doesn't establish a substance. — Gregory

What do you mean? Doesn't Thomism accept Aristotle's concept of substance?

So, numbers are fictions that don't exist as fictions. — jgill


Exactly.

Does The Maltese Falcon exist as fiction? — jgill


No, it does not. Unless, of course, you wish to distinguish conceptual existence from real existence, and to treat each as a different first-order predicate, and to declare that the existential quantifier has no ontological import. That is indeed what Mario Bunge himself does. — Arcane Sandwich

∃x(Mx∧¬Ex) - For some "x", it is the case that "x" is the Maltese Falcon, and "x" does not exist. Notice that "Existence" is a first-order predicate ("E"), and that the existential quantifier ("∃") does not have ontological import. It that sense, it would be more accurate to call it "particularizing quantifier", as opposed to the "universal quantifier" ("∀"). And what goes for the Maltese Falcon, goes for numbers.

EDIT:

Do you even understand the mind-body problem? — Harry Hindu

Yes, I do. It's like the gut-digestion problem, or the legs-walking problem: a comparison between a thing (brain, gut, legs) with a process (digesting, minding, walking). In that sense, I agree with Bunge's psychoneural identity hypothesis, as developed in his book Matter and Mind.

EDIT 2:

What does it mean for something to be useful if it has no causal efficacy?

Numbers don't exist as fictions, they exist as brain processes. — Arcane Sandwich

You are contradicting yourself (and in the same post):

Numbers are fictions, and no fictions have causal efficacy — Arcane Sandwich — Harry Hindu

As I've explained, to be (in the sense of predication) is not the same thing as to exist. In other words, being and existence are not the same thing. Numbers are fictions, without existing as fictions. For example:

∃x(Fx∧¬Ex) - For some "x", it is the case that "x" is fictional, and "x" does not exist.

Where is the contradiction, @Harry Hindu?

Certainly, the Thomist "Five Proofs" are not sound. — 180 Proof

Why not? What false premises do they contain, if they are not sound?

What do you think of Timbuktu? — Arcane Sandwich


Too hot and dry. — PoeticUniverse

But it has an impressive history.

Please explain the following song from the POV of your Theory about the Universe: — Arcane Sandwich


Anything can become of the temporaries formed by the Permanent. — PoeticUniverse

Here is the Tao that can be told, and it shows the eternal Tao (the Tao that cannot be told)

What is the source of the poem you included. Is it your own? What can you tell us about it? — T Clark


The first stanza, in italics, is Edward FitzGerald's transmogrification of Omar Khayyam. The rest are my own, as extensions of the idea of The Eternal Saki. — PoeticUniverse

What do you think of Timbuktu?

So, it's just poetry then? I have no argument with that. — Janus

Who says that it's just poetry? It can be science instead. Be cooperative, instead of intentionally trying to cause a disturbance in this Thread. I am the author of the OP and I am formally requesting you to be less disruptive. In other words, I'm giving you a "yellow card", a "warning", if you will.

It seems to me that something that can only be apprehended non-linguistically cannot be spoken about except poetically or allusively. — Janus

You are wrong, for it can be spoken about in a scientific manner.

Poetry is always a matter of interpretation with no detreminate meaning, so there cannot be any detreminable "missing of the mark". — Janus

Enough with your poetry-centrism. Things cannot be poetry all the way down.

OK, so the translations contradict one another. How do you know which is correct, or considering what I said just above, how can there be a correct and incorrect at all? — Janus

That is a very difficult question that you are asking, we all have the same question, and intellectuals have been debating this point for decades, not only in relation to the Tao Te Ching, but in relation to any written text in general.

I am not concerned with your intentions. I don't know them, I know what you say, and I respond to that with my own questions and ideas and as much on its own terms (that is without distorting it) as I can. Isn't that what we do (or should be doing) here? — Janus

I don't know if that's what we do or should be doing here. Make a case for it, and I'll consider it. Until then, I will simply say that one should be charitable towards the English language, as much as humanly possible. The same goes for every other language. If you disagree, explain why.

If everything that can be said misses the mark then there is no point discussing it. — Janus

Are you sure about that? It sounds to me that one can speak "around" it, one can allude to it, indirectly.

On the other hand how could you know if the mark has been missed if you don't know what it is? — Janus

Because it reveals itself to you, in a non-linguistic way.

The preceding verse has nothing to do with Nature, nor with what is natural. It is speaking about Tao (Greatness). — Arcane Sandwich


Nature = what is natural.
Tao follows what is natural.
Tao follows only itself.
The Nature (Tao) that can be told is not the eternal Nature (Tao). — Arcane Sandwich


You contradict yourself or the text or both. — Janus

Because I am attempting to combine two translations of the Tao Te Ching that contradict each other. See:

Tao follows what is natural. — Lao Tzu (Laozi)

The Tao follows only itself. — Translated by Stephen Mitchell, 1988

Why am I doing such a thing? Because you made that specific request when you said the following:

If you don't understand the language the text was written in, how do you know that the translator avoids a mistake? — Janus

I am trying to be as charitable as I can towards your intentions, @Janus. Are you trying to be as charitable as you can towards my intentions, yes or no?

EDIT: Even more explicitly:

If you don't understand the language the text was written in, how do you know that the translator avoids a mistake? — Janus


Ok, I will cite another English version of chapter 25, because it is the best that I can do, under these circumstances, which I cannot transcend unless I learn Mandarin (at the very least). — Arcane Sandwich

↪Arcane Sandwich
My interpretation is that it is pointing to the inadequacy of spoken language to convey the depth of meaning that is inherent in 'the Way'. — Wayfarer

Tao = The Way

Arguments about it, 'it means this', 'no it doesn't, it means that', and so forth, have already missed the mark. — Wayfarer

Yes, they have.

The true way or eternal Tao is not a verbal expression or description or anything that can be said. — Wayfarer

Yes, I agree.

Like I said every time you asked me: there is something you find in Eastern philosophies, 'the Unconditioned'. It's not God, or not like a 'sky-father' figure. But then as soon as we ask 'well what is it then?' then we've missed the mark again. — Wayfarer

Yes, we have. Indeed. Good to see that we're on the same page, you and I. So to speak, of course.

So, Man follows the Earth, which follows the Universe, which follows the Tao. No mention of Nature there. — Janus

In some other translations, the last line says "Tao follows itself". That, is an entirely different interpretation. — Arcane Sandwich

Man follows what is Great
Earth follows what is Great
Heaven follows what is Great
What is Great follows what is natural. — Arcane Sandwich

If you cannot say what you think Nature is, then how can say it is different than the Tao? — Janus

Hmmm...

Nature = "what is natural". From the following:

"What is natural" = Nature. — Arcane Sandwich

1) Tao = great.
2) If Tao = Nature, then:
3) Nature = great.

However,

4) "The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao."
5) So, if Tao = Nature, then:
6) The Nature that can be told is not the eternal Nature.

So, you do equate the Dao with the noumenal? — Janus

Hmmm...

I still have no clue what you think "Nature" refers to, and much less how it could be different than the Dao. — Janus

Nature = what is natural.
Tao follows what is natural.
Tao follows only itself.
The Nature (Tao) that can be told is not the eternal Nature (Tao).

@Wayfarer, @T Clark, what does the following phrase mean: "The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao."

It's the exact same words in the two translations that I've quoted in the preceding comment. What does it mean?

Please explain the equivocation going on, to the best of your ability. — Arcane Sandwich


See the above and provide unequivocal distinctions as I have requested. — Janus

Hmmm...

If you don't understand the language the text was written in, how do you know that the translator avoids a mistake? — Janus

Ok, I will cite another English version of chapter 25, because it is the best that I can do, under these circumstances, which I cannot transcend unless I learn Mandarin (at the very least).

25
There was something formless and perfect
before the universe was born.
It is serene. Empty.
Solitary. Unchanging.
Infinite. Eternally present.
It is the mother of the universe.
For lack of a better name,
I call it the Tao.

It flows through all things,
inside and outside, and returns
to the origin of all things.

The Tao is great.
The universe is great.
Earth is great.
Man is great.
These are the four great powers.

Man follows the earth.
Earth follows the universe.
The universe follows the Tao.
The Tao follows only itself. — Translated by Stephen Mitchell, 1988

So then in your understanding what is Nature according to Lao Tzu? — Janus

That is what the Ancient Roman philosophers called the Quaestio here.

How do you understand the difference between the manifest world and "reality itself". Are you invoking the phenomenon/ noumenon distinction? If so it sounds like you are equating nature with the noumenal. But then how would you draw a distinction between

Something mysteriously formed,
Born before heaven and Earth.
In the silence and the void,
Standing alone and unchanging,
Ever present and in motion.
Perhaps it is the mother of ten thousand things.
I do not know its name
Call it Tao.
For lack of a better word, I call it great. — Lao Tzu (Laozi)


and the noumenal? — Janus

I'll let Lao Tzu himself answer you question, in the very first line of the Tao Te Ching:

1
The tao that can be told
is not the eternal Tao
The name that can be named
is not the eternal Name.

The unnamable is the eternally real.
Naming is the origin
of all particular things.

Free from desire, you realize the mystery.
Caught in desire, you see only the manifestations.

Yet mystery and manifestations
arise from the same source.
This source is called darkness.

Darkness within darkness.
The gateway to all understanding. — Translated by Stephen Mitchell, 1988

EDIT: And here is another translation of that:

One

The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.
The name that can be named is not the eternal name.
The nameless is the beginning of heaven and Earth.
The named is the mother of the ten thousand things.
Ever desireless, one can see the mystery.
Ever desiring, one sees the manifestations.
These two spring from the same source but differ in name;
this appears as darkness.
Darkness within darkness.
The gate to all mystery. — Translated by Gia-Fu Feng (馮家福 Feng Jia-fu, 1919–1985) and Jane English (1942–) Vintage Books, 1989

Please explain the following song from the POV of your Theory about the Universe:

Yes it's what I believe. — Metaphysician Undercover

Ok.

I also just noticed that I spelled "cite" wrong. — Metaphysician Undercover

No one cares, except for Grammar Nazis. Your point was understood despite your grammatical mistake.

I'm always confused by "Heaven" and "Earth." Sometimes they mean sky and ground; sometimes the home of spirit and of humanity; sometimes yin and yang; sometimes light and dark. I see this as one depiction of the hierarchy of steps between the Tao and the king or humankind. It is presented in different steps in some other verses. As with many other elements in Taoist philosophy, it doesn't make sense to try to attach a specific definition to it. I see it as an impressionistic painting of how the world works. Just sort of soak in it.

As for "Tao follows what is natural," I'm not sure exactly what Lao Tzu is trying to tell us. I don't see as much significance in it as you do. I haven't sat down and really focused on the different verses in a long time. I probably should. — T Clark

Understood.

I forgot - the translation you provided is by Gia-Fu Feng. If I remember correctly, Jane English provided the photographs in the book they wrote together. If I weren't so lazy I would go check on that. — T Clark

Thank you very much then, it seems that I have made a mistake in attributing authorship to Jane English.

That biblical literalists can understand a given part of the bible as metaphor and still be biblical literalists. — BitconnectCarlos

No one is arguing the contrary. You're accusing me of something, and I don't even know what you're accusing me of, to begin with. But it doesn't matter. If you think that you understand Christianity better than I do, then explain why the following anecdote is not a good explanation of the story of Adam and Eve:

I actually saw, on social media (I think it was Facebook?) someone explain Adam and Eve from a "rational" point of view. This person on Facebook said, that a very long time ago, there were dinosaurs here on Earth. God created them. And then, a meteorite killed the dinosaurs. And who do you think was in that meteor? That's right, Adam and Eve. Because the meteor was actually a space ship. And, here on planet Earth, there was no metal prior to the crashing of Adam and Eve's "meteor". So where do you think that all of the metal comes from? It's from the meteorite, from the spaceship.

Please understand that I do not believe in the above explanation, for reasons that should be obvious. — Arcane Sandwich

Here's a recent metal band that I think is quite good, they have that jazzy, avant-garde thing going on, like a few bands before them (think Atheist, or Cynic, for example)

you have to have bought into your country's nationalistic ideology. — T Clark

Or on the payroll of a multi-national corporation.

@T Clark please state your opinion on Chapter 25 of the Tao Te Ching of the Jane English version.

I find I am almost always wrong when I try to predict what will happen next in politics or foreign affairs. — T Clark

I believe that is because we, the public, are also trying to think through this problem under complicated conditions, because we don't have all of the information of the overall situation either. We make educated guesses, but sometimes we get it wrong. It's understandable, given the nature of incomplete information relative to a situation that involves us.

I think the most germane question is "What could possibly go wrong?" The US doesn't seem to have a good record of figuring that out in recent decades. Maybe no one has. — T Clark

No one has. Indeed. Think of that, this way: everyone involved in that problem is operating with partial information. No actor there has complete information of the overall situation. Therefore, they make guesses, to the best of their ability. And, like any guess, it could turn out to be wrong. And in fact it has, many times.

Who is to say that the King is not instead Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia, the Second Incarnation of Christ, the Lion of Judah, who will unify all the peoples of Africa and all of the peoples of the African diaspora? — Arcane Sandwich

Perhaps the following people (to answer my own question):



EDIT: And here are the lyrics to that:

Awaking the Centuries

In the books of what will be
Written by the demon lord?

Never lift your head up to the east
'cause darkness wakes the beast!

Der Kerzen Schein
Er leuchtet fahl
Als das Sonnenlicht er stahl
Und nur das gro_e Himmelszelt
Bezeugt das Ende dieser Welt

So feed the spark
Welcome to the land of dark
Death in all the centuries is what I left behind

Take my hand
Forgotten in the promised land
Death in all the centuries is what I left behind

The knowledge, brought to the world
Is growing with a bitter taste
In a dream I saw things that will be
Centuries away

Des Mondes Schein
Er leuchtet fahl
Das Herz der Finsternis er stahl
Nun glei_end Lichte ihn umgibt
Und doch des Menschen Hoffnung siegt...?

So feed the spark
Welcome to the land of dark
Death in all the centuries is what I left behind

Take my hand
Forgotten in the promised land
Death in all the centuries is what I left behind

The night when evil steps out of the dark
And the cross is rising again
And fires are keeping the light
Burn, my friend...

And the sign of humanity is burning tonight
I can't escape from this ritual silence
Humanity's burning tonight

When I open my eyes
I see soldiers in the fields
Dead bodies on the ground
There are children in-between
Explosions shock the land
And the evil shows its face
The one called Hister rises
This is the fall of grace...

Beast ferocious from hunger will swim across rivers
The greater part of the region will be against the Hister
The great one will cause it to be dragged in an iron cage
When the German child will observe nothing

In the books of what will be
Written by the demon lord?
Never lift your head up to the east
'cause darkness wakes the beast!

Der Kerzen Schein
Er leuchtet fahl
Als das Sonnenlicht er stahl
Und nur das gro_e Himmelszelt
Bezeugt das Ende dieser Welt

So feed the spark
Welcome to the land of dark
Death in all the centuries is what I left behind

Take my hand
Forgotten in the promised land
Death in all the centuries is what I left behind

The knowledge, brought to the world
Is growing with a bitter taste
In a dream I saw things that will be
Centuries away

So feed the spark
Welcome to the land of dark
Death in all the centuries is what I left behind

Take my hand
Forgotten in the promised land
Death in all the centuries is what I left behind

And the sign of humanity is burning tonight
I can't escape from this ritual silence
Humanity's burning tonight — Haggard

@Bob Ross why are you even advancing a new "Thomistic" argument, if Thomas Aquinas himself already advanced five? So what if they're meant for the layman. That doesn't mean that they're not valid or sound. And yeah, I say that as an atheist. So what? My atheism achieves a methodological goal that no theism can: I am entirely democratic towards religions, from a theological point of view.

Is China really willing to start a war with Taiwan in order to make it part of China? — dclements

Yes, it is. Chinese culture is a Warrior culture to the core. We cannot understand it because, in that sense, we are barbarians compared to them. The East has been civilized for far longer than the West, and they have had many more wars.

The primal winds in which Our Father existed return
with the arrival of the primal space-time
with the resurgence of the primitive season.
As the old season ends
with the flowering of the lapacho tree
the winds bring the new season.
The new winds come, the new space,
bringing the resurrection of space-time. — Guarani Creation Myth

[Chorus]
I'm on the rock and then I check a stock
I have to run like a fugitive to save the life I live
I'm going to be Iron like a Lion in Zion
I'm going to be Iron like a Lion in Zion
Iron Lion Zion

[Verse]
I'm on the run but I have got no gun
See they want to be the star
So they fighting tribal war
And they saying Iron like a Lion in Zion
Iron like a Lion in Zion
Iron Lion Zion

[Chorus]
I'm on the rock, running and you running
I take a stock, running like a fugitive
I had to run like a fugitive just to save the life I live
I am going to be Iron like a Lion in Zion
I am going to be Iron like a Lion in Zion

[Outro]
Iron Lion Zion, Iron Lion Zion, Iron Lion Zion
Iron like a Lion in Zion, Iron like a lion in Zion
Iron Like a Lion in Zion — Bob Marley

EDIT:

Haile Selassie did not die.
Because Haile Selassie is God.
And God cannot die. — An anonymous Rasta

EDIT 2:

I think that we, non-Rasta folks exchanging ideas on an internet Forum, can barely catch a glimpse (if at all) of what Haile Selassie meant to the Jamaican Rasta circa the early 1970's. It wasn't just politics. There was a strong political element there, sure. But Rastafari is a religion. And it involves the ritual consumption of tetrahydrocannabinol, which is a psychoactive drug. In other words, Rastas smoke weed for religious reasons, literally. Now imagine that during a ritual smoking of weed, in that context and in those circumstances, Rastas have a religious experience, as if it were a divine revelation, that Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia, is indeed the Second Incarnation of Christ, the Lion of Judah, who will unify all the peoples of Africa and all of the peoples of the African diaspora.

Who are we to say that their religious experience is somehow less religious than the religious experiences of Protestants or Catholics, for example? — Arcane Sandwich

EDIT 3:

Therefore, "Tao is great;
Heaven is great;
Earth is great;
The king is also great."
These are the four great powers of the universe,
And the king is one of them. — Lao Tzu (Laozi)

The King is one of them. Who is to say that the King is not the Great Chinggis Khaan? — Arcane Sandwich

Knees be knelt and heads be bowed, if the Great (Tao) Chinggis Khaan is the King. — Arcane Sandwich

Who is to say that the King is not instead Haile Selassie, Emperor of Ethiopia, the Second Incarnation of Christ, the Lion of Judah, who will unify all the peoples of Africa and all of the peoples of the African diaspora?

Something mysteriously formed,
Born before heaven and Earth.
In the silence and the void,
Standing alone and unchanging,
Ever present and in motion.
Perhaps it is the mother of ten thousand things.
I do not know its name
Call it Tao.
For lack of a better word, I call it great. — Lao Tzu (Laozi)

The Primitive Customs of the Hummingbird
Our Father, the Absolute First
created himself from the primordial darkness.

He created the divine soles of his feet,
His small round throne.
He created them as he grew in the primordial darkness.

The reflection of his divine wisdom, his divine all-hearing
His divine palms holding his scepter and flowering branches
these Ñamandú created as he grew from the primordial darkness.

Flowers adorned his divine feathered headdress like drops of dew;
And amidst the flowers of his sacred feathered crown
Hummingbird, the primeval bird, gamboled and flew.

Even while our first Father created his own divine body,
He existed in the midst of the primordial winds.

Before he conceived his future earthly dwelling,
before he conceived his future heavens, his future earth —
Hummingbird refreshed his mouth.

It was Hummingbird who sustained Ñamandú with the fruits of paradise.

Our Father Ñamandú, the First,
before he created his future paradise
He did not see the darkness
although the sun did not yet exist.

The reflection of his own heart illuminated him;
His divine wisdom served as the sun.

Our true Father Ñamandú, the First,
dwelt amidst the primordial winds;
Where he stopped to rest
the Owl produced darkness:
for already the cradle of night existed.

Before the true Father Ñamandú, the First,
created his future paradise, before the creation of the first earth,
He existed in the midst of the primordial winds.

The primal winds in which Our Father existed return
with the arrival of the primal space-time
with the resurgence of the primitive season.
As the old season ends
with the flowering of the lapacho tree
the winds bring the new season.
The new winds come, the new space,
bringing the resurrection of space-time. — Guarani Creation Myth

Aquina's didn't just argue for God's existence with the five ways: those were more of a cheat sheet for laymen. — Bob Ross

And how are we, here, different from laymen? One does not cease to be a layman when one philosophizes, as much as one would like to believe the contrary.

Something mysteriously formed,
Born before heaven and Earth.
In the silence and the void,
Standing alone and unchanging,
Ever present and in motion.
Perhaps it is the mother of ten thousand things.
I do not know its name
Call it Tao.
For lack of a better word, I call it great. — Lao Tzu (Laozi)

I tend to associate this passage with what Hesiod says in his Theogony about Xaos (Chaos). I also relate it to the Primitive Customs of the Hummingbird of Guarani Mythology. Is this senseless to you? — Arcane Sandwich

No that's definitely in the ball park! 'Axial age', as I say. That's a very useful idea in this context. It's associated with Karl Jaspers but has also been written on by Karen Armstrong. It's about the fact that around 6th-3rd centuries B.C.E. a number of prophets and sages were active, including Pythagoras, Lao Tsu, the Buddha, and others, who set the wheels in motion for what were to become the great cultural formations of India, China and the West. — Wayfarer

Hail, children of Zeus!
Grant lovely song
and celebrate the holy race of the deathless gods who are forever,
those that were born of Earth and starry Heaven and gloomy Night
and them that briny Sea did rear.

Tell how at the first gods and earth came to be,
and rivers,
and the boundless sea with its raging swell,
and the gleaming stars,
and the wide heaven above,
and the gods who were born of them, givers of good things,
and how they divided their wealth,
and how they shared their honors amongst them,
and also how at the first they took many-folded Olympus.

These things declare to me from the beginning, you Muses who dwell in the house of Olympus,
and tell me which of them first came to be.

In truth at first Chaos came to be,

but next wide-bosomed Earth,
the ever-sure foundation of all
the deathless ones who hold the peaks of snowy Olympus,
and dim Tartarus in the depth of the wide-pathed Earth,

and Eros (Love),
fairest among the deathless gods,
who unnerves the limbs and overcomes the mind
and wise counsels of all gods and all men within them.

From Chaos came forth Erebus and black Night;
but of Night were born
Aether
and Day — Hesiod (Theogony)

better to find a Chinese speaker! — Wayfarer

They don't like me. They translated one of my papers on Meillassoux and Badiou, and they laughed at what I said. And what's even worse is that they said all of that in Chinese. I had to translate it myself, with the help of Google Translate.

EDIT: And they don't like me, even though I know more about heavy metal than they do. For example, the best heavy metal band from China is Tang Dynasty. And the Chinese people that read my philosophical papers don't even know that Tang Dynasty is a heavy metal band from China.

@Wayfarer what do you think of this ?

I studied comparative religion, and one of the major authors in that field is Mircea Eliade, a Romanian-American active at the University of Chicago mid-century. — Wayfarer

Yes, I'm familiar with his work, I had to study it at the Uni, it was part of the curricula. I don't agree with Eliade's views. I'm more sympathetic to Joseph Campbell's The Power of Myth here. But Campbell could be wrong and Eliade could be right, for all I know. This area isn't exactly my specialty either.

The problem with modern Western culture is that so many of those ideas are stereotyped under the heading of religion, — Wayfarer

Yes, that is indeed the main problem here.

when they're very different from how that term is usually interpreted. — Wayfarer

Exactly.

Therefore, "Tao is great;
Heaven is great;
Earth is great;
The king is also great."
These are the four great powers of the universe,
And the king is one of them. — Lao Tzu (Laozi)

The King is one of them. Who is to say that the King is not the Great Chinggis Khaan?

Cherished the wisdom of thinkers
Declared deliverance and the Gereg
The bearer of the eternal Tengri
The king of the blue world
The Great Chinggis Khaan

Knees be knelt and heads be bowed
Engaged the world with the wisdom of Tengri
Declared the empire with law and order
The scourge of the eternal Tengri — The HU

Knees be knelt and heads be bowed, if the Great (Tao) Chinggis Khaan is the King.

I can see parallels in other Axial Age texts and concepts. The idea I'd like to call out is an expression 'the uncarved block' which is found in Taoist texts. It refers to the unconditioned, the unmade, which is also the subject of the above. There is no parallel in the English lexicon or culture. — Wayfarer

How would you explain this part, specifically, to an English audience?

But this should never be confused with modern naturalism, which has been conscientiously defined to exclude such nefarious and amorphous ideas. — Wayfarer

I agree, 100%.

I'm always reticent when it comes to this text as it is deeply intertwined with Chinese culture and language and my knowledge of them is cursory. But I can see parallels in other Axial Age texts and concepts. The idea I'd like to call out is an expression 'the uncarved block' which is found in Taoist texts. It refers to the unconditioned, the unmade, which is also the subject of the above. There is no parallel in the English lexicon or culture. It is associated with ancient asceticism and shamanic or yogic practices of trance states, what Indian culture would call samadhi. But these are non-conceptual states, hence 'for the lack of a better word' and 'I do not know its name'. Other like sayings are 'the nameless if the mother of the ten thousand things'. Some parallels can be drawn with Plotinus' One, but with great intepretive care. — Wayfarer

I tend to associate this passage with what Hesiod says in his Theogony about Xaos (Chaos). I also relate it to the Primitive Customs of the Hummingbird of Guarani Mythology. Is this senseless to you?

So if nature is the manifest world — Janus

Is it? Perhaps it is the real world instead. Perhaps Nature is Reality Itself. Tao (Greatness) is simply a manifestation of Nature.

according to this verse. — Janus

The preceding verse has nothing to do with Nature, nor with what is natural. It is speaking about Tao (Greatness). That is the name that Lao Tzu (Laozi) gives it, because he does not know its name. Perhaps it is the mother of ten thousand things. We call it great, only for the lack of a better word, as Laozi (Lao Tzu) says.

We cannot follow that which is — Janus

No, we cannot. That is the reason why the last line of 25 says: The Tao follows what is natural. It does not say that Greatness follows Greatness, or that the Tao follows itself. There are translations that make this mistake, but Jane English did not make this mistake in her translation, which is the one that we are using in this Thread. Feel free to explain why we should include other translations.

So, there seems to be some equivocation going on — Janus

Please explain the equivocation going on, to the best of your ability.

I'm not sure that I'm a relationist, but if that's the category that comes to mind through the conversation I ought investigate it — Moliere

Well, look at it from a methodological POV: if you have no substances in your ontology, what element is doing the work that the classical substances are supposed to do? The inference-to-best-explanation for that is "relations", though it could be "properties" instead (i.e., classical British Empiricism, like in Berkeley or Hume). It could instead be "events", it could instead be "processes" (like in Whitehead's process ontology). It could be "Being" and "Event", as in Badiou, etc. There's a lot to choose from, but "relations" seem like the most reasonable option here, if you discard classical substances.

Also, should say, it's been a blast going back and forth. I find it hard to articulate my own positions a lot of the time and you helped me define some things I think about. — Moliere

It's been a blast as well! :up:

if anyone understands the Thomistic argument for that part I would much appreciate an explanation — Bob Ross

Bob, I say this with no disrespect, I don't even understand what's Thomistic about your argument to begin with. Thomas Aquinas famously stated five arguments, also known as five ways, for one to be able to arrive at the conclusion that God exists. He did not resort to 40 or so premises in any of the five proofs that he gave. That, is the essence of Thomism, as far as I'm concerned. And even if it isn't, what is it about your argument that can be characterized as "Thomistic"?

You can do what I do: just accept substances. It's like, you're not going to turn into a fascist just because you have a concept of substance in your personal philosophy. — Arcane Sandwich


I just don't think it makes sense, truly. So I want to drop it for that reason. — Moliere

I can respect that. You disagree with substances on a conceptual level, because they have no methodological role to play in your ontology. In other words, you're a good ol' fashioned relationist. Not a co-relationist, just a relationist. Like Bruno Latour, for example.

@Wayfarer you are formally and officially invited to state your opinion on such matters. As everyone is.

EDIT: @Moliere this might interest you, given our most recent philosophical conversation elsewhere on this Forum.