Comments

  • What is Being?
    It might seem that the statements
    2*a = b
    b = 4
    follow each other but they "happen" at the same time. There is only one "b" - it denotes one and the same object. Of course this is an idealization. But note this not me starting at the period as the object itself is ideal in first place. When it comes to senses: There is a qualitative difference between seeing, hearing, tasting and so on. Are those senses identical to themselves?
  • What is Being?
    Formal systems do indeed presume persistence -- the persistence of symbols, as mathematics presumes a persistence of number.Xtrix
    Mathematics do not know time. For example the law of the excluded middle states that any sentence must be either wrong or true. It doesn't matter if one or the other or none was shown. It does not know change. To conclude from this that is presupposes "persistence" is not directly correct as there simply is no difference that would allow to say such a thing.
  • What is Being?
    Two persons blu a baloon, this is his, and this ballon is from another person, you pup the ballons, where air goes???Nothing
    Closer to the nature of being it seems
  • What is Being?
    If that is the case, then any object that changes is missing here; and since "something" runs its course in every process, no process is in question. There is nothing here that changes, and for that reason it also makes no sense to speak of something that endures. It is nonsensical to want to find something here that remains unchanged for even an instant during the course of its duration.Joshs
    To me this seems like a mere thought experiment. The totally of sensations always provides for a reference of duration. The body itself generates difference all the time - think of circulating blood or breath. It is not only external objects one would focus on that generates change. It is not even sensations that come clearly to mind as such if you think of the feelings of rest or unrest.for example.
  • What is Being?
    Because formal logic depends on the notion of the self-identical object.Joshs

    So you are suggesting to ditch the positive identity and fall back to identity as difference? How could this look for "Dasein"?
  • What is Being?
    And the stars?Heiko

    I am sorry. The point, again, is that the being of mere tools made for a purpose, is not what seems worth a lengthy discussion. A hammer is a tool to put nails into walls.
  • What is Being?
    Not for Heidegger. He has a very particular understanding of ‘world’ that is neither planned nor just ‘revealed’ , and not a product of reflective reasoning. World for Heidegger is projected out from a pragmatic backgroundJoshs

    And the stars?
  • What is Being?
    Yes, he makes the distinction between the ready to hand and the present to hand ( objectively present ). But he derives the present to hand from the ready to hand as an extreme modification of it. His discussion of the statement and subject-predicate logic shows how a thing which just ‘is’ is derived from the hermeneutic structure of concernful dealings, rather than use and value being attributes just added onto an objectively present thing.Joshs

    For a hammer this might be true. There is not too much to doubt about the meaning, purpose or function of a hammer, because it is just a human-invented tool. The world, the sky and the stars, on the other hand, have a mode of being which is not grounded in a process of reflected reasoning. Their existence is, in a stronger sense, revealed rather than "planned".
  • What is Being?
    In Being and Time he states
    The Greeks had an appropriate term for 'Things': 1rpayp.a-ra-that is
    to say, that which one has to do with in one's concernful dealings
    But ontologically, the specifically 'pragmatic' character of the 1rpayJLa-ra is just what the Greeks left in obscurity ; they thought of these 'proximally' as 'mere Things'. We shall call those entities which we encounter in concern "equipment". In our dealings we come across
    equipment fo r writing, sewing, working, transportation, measurement.
    The kind of Being which equipment possesses must be exhibited. The
    clue for doing this lies in our first defining what makes an item of equip­ment - namely, its equipmentality.
    Taken strictly, there 'is' no such thing as an equipment. To the Being
    of any equipment there always belongs a totality of equipment, in which
    it can be this equipment that it is. Equipment is essentially 'something
    in-order-to . . . A totality of equipment is constituted by various ways of the 'in-order-to', such as serviceability, conduciveness, usability, manipulability. In the 'in-order-to' as a structure there lies an assignment or referernce of something to something.
    Emphasis mine - sorry for bad copy&paste.

    In German, the formulation is somewhat stronger
    Ein Zeug »ist« strenggenommen nie.
    Equipment, taken strictly, never "is".

    I take this passage to mean that Heidegger really does make such a distinction. A speculative reason is given above.
  • What is Being?
    Here’s a phenomenological way of putting it:

    “ “Equipment is “in order to.” This proposition has an ontological and not merely an ontical meaning; a being is not what and how it is, for example, a hammer, and then in addition something “with which to hammer.” Rather, what and how it is as this entity, its whatness and howness, is constituted by this in-order-to as such, by its functionality. A being of the nature of equipment is thus encountered as the being that it is in itself if and when we understand beforehand the following: functionality, functionality relations, functionality totality. In dealing with equipment we can use it as equipment only if we have already beforehand projected this entity upon functionality relation.”(Basic Problems of phenomenology 1927)
    Joshs

    I take this to mean that the hammer was manufactured with a certain, known intention and therefor it's being is in-itself when we understand that intention. But note that this happened in an act of human work and is different to a mere revelation of being in that the hammer was invented by reflecting over use, need and purpose.
  • What is Being?
    I'm good with that, but I'm not sure it provides a 'way in' for someone starting from a 'categorical' understanding. If you think categorically, then you can still say, a real apple is an apple and an imaginary apple isn't; a real apple can be sweet or tart, crisp or mushy, but an imaginary apple can't be. And then you're just puzzled, because imagination is puzzling, and now you're thinking about that instead of being. The whole approach of taking a 'complete' description of an object, as a collection of properties, and just adding or subtracting instantiation, checking the 'exists' box or not -- it's not that that doesn't lead anywhere, but it leads you in the wrong direction.Srap Tasmaner

    But wasn't the point of existentialism that the categorial understanding follows the apple's existence?
    An apple is stating itself as an apple - all we can ever say about it would be a reflective category, that is, a negation. The apple asserts it's own existence which is why a language game can never create apples but can distinguish if a given thing is an apple or some other fruit.
    We can refecively think about apples but not the apple itself.
  • What is Being?
    That’s fine, but it’s not that we can’t atomize it— we can and do. It’s that we don’t wanted to mistake this for “lived” or “felt” time.Xtrix

    I'd rather say the point is that time is the measure of change, not the other way around.
  • What is Being?
    I'd say the real apple is an apple that reveals itself as an apple whereas the imaginary apple is an apple that reveals itself as imagination.
  • The measure of mind
    Sure, we know more stuff now than they did back then, but we aren't smarter or wiser. Today we use science. Those guys invented it.T Clark
    The mass of detail may obstruct the view of the essential. Taking maths as an example it seems you can get through quite a few (even university-)courses by just manipulating formulae - which could be done by a computer. You get formal definitions of spaces, homomorphisms, have to prove x->y is such and go on. May be my fault, but putting such stuff together to be even able to ask some kind of "essential" question is something modern education does not seem to have the time for. Looking at some youtube video (e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVF4N1Ix5WI ) you can get a feeling of what masses of formalism you'd have to chew down to work on open, fundamental questions.
    There is no chance to be that kind of genius that has something new and valuable to say over so many things. The undeveloped state of knowledge opened that opporunity.

    Is the mind in what is understood, or in the way in which it understands?Pantagruel
    How could that be a difference?
  • What is Being?
    And maybe abstraction is always like this — we’ll say ‘ignoring’ all except the features you’ve chosen, but maybe ‘ignoring’ means ‘pretending not to notice’.Srap Tasmaner
    A triangle can be little, large, flat or pointy. To me, it is not clear at all which same- or alike-ness would make up for the essential properties of an arbitrary determination.
  • What is Being?
    My impression, though, is that Heidegger thinks logical relations are themselves in need of grounding, rather than grounding what we might have to say about the being of things. I suppose that passes over your point about identity, but here identity seems to be a sort of raw demonstrative ‘that’.Srap Tasmaner
    On the other hand, coming back to the use-character, Heidegger points out that such stuff really "isn't" in some sense. I guess this has to do with the intention the things were created with. Again, going back to Hegel it is totally unclear what was meant with "Dasein", which cannot be said of a hammer or some other "human" invention.
  • What is Being?
    Does it make sense for me to be oriented toward something as something that ‘just is’?Srap Tasmaner
    I think it does. You do not need to know what is flying towards you to react. You do not need to know if it is a telephone-pole or a streetlight that you nearly walked into.
    That said I agree that recognition of known things does not necessarily seem to require additional thought - one is usually too relaxed when in a known environemt to be continuously asking if the "thing there" might be dangerous.

    PS: On the other hand all unexpected "movement" raises suspicion.
  • What is Being?
    We can give no meaning to ‘that thing’ and have no use for it, so it’s unlikely to be our first choice if we can guess ‘tree’ instead and change it ‘telephone pole’ later if we have to.Srap Tasmaner
    But in this sense it is not about use, it is about what gains identity and so just "is" without spending any further thought. It is purely phenomenological. With further determinations we get into socially mediated concepts. I do not know many kinds of trees, so which "level of abstraction" would be low enough? And which woods are suitable for telephone poles? That would require some inquiry. And is that tree even a tree or is there some biological distinction, for example, is it a small tree or a giant mushroom? While thinking about those questions and considering what remains the same is "the thing there". In fact this seems to be the quickest, most immediate notion that one can possibly have. Maybe the "thing" is exaggerated and in fact it is just a "there"
  • What is Being?
    But on what do I impose it? Is there not a primary phenomenon there of a fallen tree? ...
    Will you say that I have imposed ‘tree’ on a selection of my visual field?
    Srap Tasmaner
    I'd indeed say the "interpretation" or recognition as a tree comes after the "that thing there". It happens all the time that one can not exactly identify what he is seeing. It's an undetermined "Dasein"(being-there) which becomes "Etwas"(a determined something) - lending from Hegel.
    When it comes to the determination I'd indeed say, this is imposed, but also happens without reflection to some degree. After seeing a tree for the first time, it is likely following trees of the same kind will be recognized as similar to the first. More detailed classifications likely require reflection of the concept and a more thorough investigation.
  • What is Being?
    Existence would be the way that the particulars ( a thing that is f) alters the sense of the subject that they are particulars of. Formal logic supposes that the subject and predicate sit still as self-identical contents , while we cobble them together in an external relation.Joshs
    The first sentence took me some time. I don't think that "alteration" is the right word there - "defines" would be more appropiate, I think. When using the existential quantor the "x" typically appears in the predicate as well. It does not seem to make sense to say "There is an x, so that 3=3" (atough the grammar indeed seems to allow this - but I would have to look that up).
  • What is Being?
    Anyone for the idea, expressed to the OP I think, that existence is in the relation between subject and predicate rather than inhering in one or
    the other?
    Joshs

    Does being happen?
  • What is Being?
    Rather, in predicating to something one assumes that the something is there for discussion.Banno
    So being literally has no properties?
  • What is Being?
    Roughly, to be is to be the subject of a predicate.Banno

    So, when talking about being, we would predicate being. Therefor being would have to be something that exists. But this seemingly cannot be the case as being alledgedly isn't ontic. Any thoughts on this?
  • What is Being?
    No it isn’t.Xtrix

    Exactly. Which is why the statement "Harry Potter exists" is underdetermined and misleading. We would understand it as "Harry Potter is a real person" which he is not. "Harry Potter is a fictional character" on the other hand explicitely expresses the mode of his existence and makes perfect sense.
  • What is Being?
    What do you mean by imagination?john27
    A mental picture of an apple, for example. Could be a painted image as well.
  • What is Being?
    "Ronald McDonald does not eat spinach" is not like ""Ronald McDonald does not exist".Banno
    Wouldn't this mean Harry Potter exists? It is just that he is no real person but a fictive figure.

    Do thoughts generate existence?john27
    If you imagine an apple then there surely is an imagination of an apple. I do not see inaccuracies of spoken language to be a problem. If you buy a painting of a dragon there must be an idea of what a dragon looks like.
  • What is Being?
    It was Popper’s way of showing that he was stuck in a Kantian time warp.Joshs
    Exactly - the _negative_ account is the corrective.
  • What is Being?
    Or just different ones. What was the point of "falsification" again?
  • What is Being?
    not according to KUHN.Joshs
    I am really not concerned with Kuhn. I am more or less talking to you. But if you take his words to mean that assuming a flat earth is scientifically justified, you must have read him wrong or he is an idiot.
  • What is Being?
    What about the relationship between me as a scientist and an empirical realm?Joshs

    Reality becomes visible when theories do _not_ hold. I doubt you can "construe" a vase out of thin air.
  • What is Being?
    I can construe something as a vase but there are many, many different ways of doing this.Joshs

    There it is again. "You can construe". This is not the relation between you and a vase.
  • What is Being?
    I’m nit sure I understand why a construct is ‘missing something’ or doesn’t ‘tell the truth’. Missing what? What truth?Joshs

    I just cite your argument:

    To experience anything is to construe it. And he defines a construct as a referential differential. Specifically, a construct is a dimension along which to perceive an event along dimensions of likeness and difference with respect with a prior meaning in our construct system. Furthermore, every new moment in time must be construed, so our construct system is changing from
    moment to moment.
    Joshs

    It is not me who doubts the vase is a vase until it isn't anymore.
  • What is Being?
    What if the object doesn’t crumble into pieces? Does it have an identity up till the time it crumbles? If the identity doesn’t lie in the thing , where does it lie?Joshs

    In "being" itself. The point is that a vase is just a vase. It doesn't matter the slightest that it could turn into a pile of broken glass any moment - until it really becomes one. It is a "real vase". You could not convince yourself the vase was a pile of broken glass. It could even become a pile of sand if we started grinding it. Doesn't matter at all. It _is_ a vase. That is what "being" itself wants it to be.
    To show the stupidity I'll borrow your own vocabulary: Say the vase is a construct. That is deemed of missing something therefor you should reflect on the construct "construct"? Doesn't that miss something? More than that: I could not convince myself the vase was a pile of glass. So, taking the vase as a vase means there was no contradiction. But now there is a construct "construct" because constructs were deemed to not tell "the truth"? Please....
  • What is Being?
    Built into your model of reality is an ‘in-itself. You wouldn’t call it reality otherwise. How else does what happens negate or correct if not by the effect of something that persists or endures as what it ‘is’, independent of the context of your expectations and background of undersranding , and independent of social context of use?Joshs

    No, that is a supposed identity of the object. If the object crumbles into pieces the identity is lost. The identity certainly does not lie in the thing.
  • What is Being?
    If we try to point to what it supposedly ‘is’ in itself , it vanishes, because it isn’t anything ‘in itself’.Joshs
    You are missing the point. The "in-itself" is a speculation. The "thing" will negate any phantasm you might have about it by itself. This is what is called reality. For example, if you mistake a table decoration for a real apple you will recognize it when it really matters.

    It is only what it is as a comparison, and we need both sides of the comparison in order to have the event, the construct.Joshs
    There is no construct, that is the real thing. If there is no reality preventing you from upholding a belief about it then the description, in fact, matches the subject. Propagating a general doubt "just because" is not backed by any reality, irrational, destructive and dishonest.

    I would argue it isn’t ‘being’ that is the abstraction , it is the idea of a thing in itself as static state,Joshs
    Yes, "in itself" - you got it.
  • What is Being?
    There is a more fundamental thinking that penetrates beneath the idea of a world as a container with ‘parts’(existing beings) of which we are just one more. Rather than the world being just object beings that are presented before a subject being ( who is also an object within that world), the world ( including the subject) is enacted , produced , synthesized rather than just mirrored and represented. From this vantage , ‘being’ isn’t the existing parts, it’s the synthesizing, enacting , producing activity that creates and recreates the subject and object poles. The being of this world is in its becoming, and our own indissociable becoming. ( Is that obscure enough for ya?)Joshs

    The interesting question: If the world, the things, just everything is the real production of "being", why should we not concern ourselves with them? The mysticism is of a kind that says "Okay, these things _are_ but beyond those, if you try hard, there is the world of being." But being "mediates" itself towards itself by those things. When shifting view away from the things as they _are_ towards "being", you are hunting a mere abstraction. The absolute nothingness.
  • What is Being?
    The reason that this is not logical is that it presumes 'we know how things are'Wayfarer

    Which is a statement about the present. The non-logical part is about what things will be. You give account of this by saying "Then there is". So the problem is not "being" anymore but "becoming". It would be an antinomy to say things were not what they are. More than this, it is purely speculative that things will become something else.
  • What is Being?
    If there is a tree in your way, you just cannot walk further. What is rationally undenyable lies in what cannot be case. The best positive statements can achieve is to not be wrong obviously.
    Maybe we have to see things as what they essentially are: sources of pure negativity, footprints of nothingness, phantastic structures of pure chaos.
  • What is Being?
    Being-there comes from being in the world. The central focus for Heidegger has always been Being. That is, a questioning of the word ‘is’ that we stick between subject and predicate as some sort of neutral glue.Joshs
    My point remains that you are treating ‘self’ here as an object in the world.Joshs
    Dasein has to be what it is. Whenever you determine something, it is and can only be an "object".
    Heidegger said something about the very term "existence" meaning something like "standing out into being". You are right with Heidegger's focus: He is not primarily concerned with the being of Dasein, but asks more or less, why it is the way it is. Being has given itself the form of innerworldy Dasein. Why?

    PS: The appropriate reply, for you, is of course: Because it _is_ innerworldy Dasein.
  • What is Being?
    A huge difference , when you add what else he says about Dasein.Joshs

    But who was talking about that? We talked about the intention for chosing that term.