So today I'm having yogurt with honey for dinner. I feel like Caesar -- wealthy, Greek, and slightly malnourished.
Caesar probably ate balanced meals. I'll look it up later.
Interesting thing about that, though. At first I didn't like the texture of honey and yogurt together, because the honey would harden and not mix with the yogurt. Then I thought, "why don't I like this?" and I came up with the idea to try "just deciding to like it", and now I like it. I wonder how many of my likes and dislikes can be changed so easily.
I'm not sure how to feel about the above train of thought, though. Am I so fickle? Maybe worse, am I so spoiled? Is the root of this issue that I have not managed to know myself?
On the way home from work today, I was listening to music on my phone, and I heard a song I wasn't in the mood for, but I listened to it anyway so that I could consider the feeling of being subjected to sounds I don't want. The problem was that as soon as I came to terms with the decision to listen anyway, I lost the feeling of distaste, and the experiment was a flop. Or maybe not -- I suppose I learned something from it.
So to follow up on my post from January 11, 2014: I have been frequently considering the points I laid out on December 20. I stand by every point I made, but I think that a few of them deserve clarification. I'll start with the most codependent point with which I took issue, and then work backwards to the more foundational one.
I said that the Logos should have a reason for everything it does, therefore "want", therefore "desire", therefore "person". At a glance, this seems like a pretty weak argument. That's why I posted on Jan 11 saying that I might rethink the point. Here's the thing: in order to understand this point, you have to simultaneously consider the previous points.
Namely, the Logos should have actively revealed itself. Active implies decision making. Decision making with purpose is the same as acting on desire, isn't it? Therefore, "person".
But everything has a reason for everything it does. A dropped rock has a reason for falling. It's active decision making that gives a thing person. So, why does the Logos have to be active? Because if it is not active, then it cannot have revealed itself in any different way than a rock reveals itself, and we rely on our physical senses to accidentally observe it. It doesn't fit the rest of the points if it isn't active.
Now, as what may seem at first to be an exercise in futility, I think I should attempt to point out the meaning of "person", because every worldview has a different definition of what constitutes a person. If we are state machines, then we have no more person than a rock, which responds to its environment by falling when there is nothing under it. We respond to our environment in more complex, but ultimately equivalent fashion.
To a Christian, person has a certain intrinsic, almost esoteric value. Christians explain it by saying "well, we're made in the image of God", but if you're trying to be "neutral" (which is impossible), then that value defines us as more than reactionary elements in the universe; as active elements with potential for truly random interaction with the world around them -- potential to for the intangible substance of our thoughts to break the laws of causality which constrain the physical brain they dwell in. (Perhaps via the influence of something supernatural, like God or our spirit.)
To an atheist, that is impossible, which is why the atheist cannot and should not pretend that his worldview supports intrinsic value in the happiness or well being of humans. That is, for an atheist to live in a way consistent with his worldview, the atheist should not pretend that he or anyone else "should" have morals. In the Atheist worldview we are just complicated rocks, and our children smash less complicated rocks with pleasure. Since our brains are defined by the laws of causality, our "thoughts" don't exist as anything more than impulse responses to our environment -- energy moving from higher density to lower density.
Which is right? Well, for an atheist, it doesn't matter what's right. It leads me to another way to justify the existence of God (or the Logos, if you would prefer me to continue under pretense at this point). Since, I suppose, value exists, so must also God exist. If you presuppose that anything has value, or that anything "should" be any way, then it is necessary that an ultimate justification exists to support your claim.
"rock"
Friday, January 30, 2015
Sunday, January 18, 2015
This song is on my mind right now
Mama Cass -- what a babe.
Right now my job has me up a tree. I have some really good excuses for the problems I've experienced, but my only option is taking responsibility despite them... which is frustrating and humbling, but not insurmountable.
People have, my entire life, accused me of having my head in the clouds. I think it would be ok for me to be that way as long as I didn't have to interact with customers. I suppose I have to learn some social skills. Right now my primary means of relating to people is to dig for the foundation of their worldview and try to let them do most of the talking.
I feel like even if I understand something well, it is just the part of it which I understand least that the customer is interested in. Maybe it's because the project is unfinished.
I have learned quite a bit from this job. I learned to never let other people in my code without strict supervision followed by immediate reorganizing; I learned to never let the customer try to calibrate a piece of equipment, even if he has the manual next to him (because if he messes it up, I get blamed); I learned never to leave even one commented-out part of the code unfinished in order to go work on another part; I learned that I should not trust even experienced people to work on my project without me unless they have had plenty of time for me to bring them up to speed; and maybe most of all, I learned that I should not take vacations within 2 months of a project closing.
I also noticed some areas where I need to learn more. As mentioned above, I need to work on my social skills. Specifically, I need to get used to not letting on that I don't know how to fix something. I really struggle with this, but the fact is: when a problem initially occurs, you don't know how to fix it until you figure out how to fix it. If you did, the problem wouldn't have happened or at least it wouldn't have been a problem. I've gotta learn how prioritize issues. At the beginning of the project, there were tons of issues, and I tried to tackle multiple of them at once. I also need to learn how to handle new tasks issued by the customer. The customer asks for "small things", and says, "that should be easy to put in the code, right?", and either he's wrong, or he's asked for too many "small" and "easy things". Those cases need to be change-orders, so that my hours are justified. I need to learn how to tell the difference between an easy thing and a hard thing, and I need to learn how to give non-answers to customers who ask me to do things, so that I can go to my PM first.
I've already got my next task assigned to me. It's gotta go better than this one did.
"And if you can't handle that..."
Right now my job has me up a tree. I have some really good excuses for the problems I've experienced, but my only option is taking responsibility despite them... which is frustrating and humbling, but not insurmountable.
People have, my entire life, accused me of having my head in the clouds. I think it would be ok for me to be that way as long as I didn't have to interact with customers. I suppose I have to learn some social skills. Right now my primary means of relating to people is to dig for the foundation of their worldview and try to let them do most of the talking.
I feel like even if I understand something well, it is just the part of it which I understand least that the customer is interested in. Maybe it's because the project is unfinished.
I have learned quite a bit from this job. I learned to never let other people in my code without strict supervision followed by immediate reorganizing; I learned to never let the customer try to calibrate a piece of equipment, even if he has the manual next to him (because if he messes it up, I get blamed); I learned never to leave even one commented-out part of the code unfinished in order to go work on another part; I learned that I should not trust even experienced people to work on my project without me unless they have had plenty of time for me to bring them up to speed; and maybe most of all, I learned that I should not take vacations within 2 months of a project closing.
I also noticed some areas where I need to learn more. As mentioned above, I need to work on my social skills. Specifically, I need to get used to not letting on that I don't know how to fix something. I really struggle with this, but the fact is: when a problem initially occurs, you don't know how to fix it until you figure out how to fix it. If you did, the problem wouldn't have happened or at least it wouldn't have been a problem. I've gotta learn how prioritize issues. At the beginning of the project, there were tons of issues, and I tried to tackle multiple of them at once. I also need to learn how to handle new tasks issued by the customer. The customer asks for "small things", and says, "that should be easy to put in the code, right?", and either he's wrong, or he's asked for too many "small" and "easy things". Those cases need to be change-orders, so that my hours are justified. I need to learn how to tell the difference between an easy thing and a hard thing, and I need to learn how to give non-answers to customers who ask me to do things, so that I can go to my PM first.
I've already got my next task assigned to me. It's gotta go better than this one did.
"And if you can't handle that..."
Sunday, January 11, 2015
Ok. I've developed those points from my previous post a bit more since I posted them, but I feel like they still have the same basic arguments in each place. On my own, I noticed some things about these arguments that I think might need a bit of improvement. I'm working through it in my head, and I'll post more about it when I have decided that it surely needs to change, and when I have articulated that change.
I recently heard someone say that internet debates are fruitless. I can understand why they would say that, but I think I'm going to get into the world of internet debating anyway. Angry YouTube comments, here I come!
"Beyond any words, any songs, any prayer that is whispered, in this world, and the next world, and the next world, and the next world."
I recently heard someone say that internet debates are fruitless. I can understand why they would say that, but I think I'm going to get into the world of internet debating anyway. Angry YouTube comments, here I come!
"Beyond any words, any songs, any prayer that is whispered, in this world, and the next world, and the next world, and the next world."
Saturday, December 20, 2014
This post wraps up the series.
In case you're jumping into my blog for the first time here, I'm working on a sort of "series", where I have attempted to throw away my presuppositions as much as is possible for me, and I have attempted to rebuild a framework wherein I can live and approach life with a certain measure of confidence (just enough to justify me in living and acting at all). That is to say, my goal ended up clarifying itself down to this: "to only allow myself one presupposition -- knowledge is possible". If knowledge is not possible, then I cannot build a presupposition, or any supposition for that matter.
The following are the dates of the posts which comprise this series:
May 18, 2014
June 2, 2014
June 4, 2014
June 10, 2014
June 11, 2014
November 15, 2014
December 20, 2014
On June 10, I hit a dead-end, which I spent a lot of time thinking about and attempting to recover from. A few times I thought I had an answer, but I didn't want to put it down until I had something I could be sure of. I, in my pride, clumsily attempted to recover from it in my post on June 11, but really I wasn't sure how to proceed. Here I confess that pride to my few readers and apologize for putting up a false confidence.
Now, I can boldly and confidently deliver an answer to you, because I have found the answer. Instead of asserting a point of view, I have attempted to deduce a set of requirements which must be met by any point of view, and then attempted to build a viable point of view with them as a foundation.
So, last time I wrote here, I think I established a need for a Logos. The idea was, "Either there's a Logos, or we can't be sure of anything we know"; and by consequence, "If we can't be sure of anything we know, then we don't know anything. Nothing is certain. There is no truth." That is, within the framework established by my previous posts, we have this Logos. The Logos exists, but we haven't established our ability to know anything yet, necessarily. At the end of my last post, we're similar to agnostic.
At this point, when I say "truth" and "Logos", I am referring to the truth that we've been searching for in all the past posts in the series. Therefore, in the posts following this one, I might make statements that seem circular, such as when answering the question, "How do we know that the Logos exists?", my answer will encompass the lengthy explanations I've already given, so that I don't have to repeat it all. The answer might be: "The Logos exists because the truth exists, and the truth exists because the Logos exists.". This statement seems fallaciously circular if you haven't read my previous posts.
OK OK Here we go -- the meat of the post starts here:
I want to see what we can discover about this Logos simply by deduction (based on the presupposition that "knowledge is possible", or "knowledge of truth is possible"), and by fitting it into the framework that we've established is necessary for the existence of truth and reliability of observation. So, remember: The reason a Logos is necessary is because without it we can't have absolute truth; and nothing can be known. That means that by taking on this endeavor, we've already established that we are not accepting religions wherein there is no Logos, or the Logos is potentially unknowable, such as Atheism, Agnosticism, Buddhism and Gnosticism.
We know that the Logos must be internally consistent, or else it is not a good foundation on which to build truth, and it does not fulfill the purpose for which we've established it is necessary for Logos to exist. That rules out every religion wherein a deity has either lied or been inconsistent; this includes most of the religions established in Europe and Asia, including the Roman and Greek gods.
The Logos must govern everything, and be consistent with everything. If it doesn't govern and consist with everything, then that thing which is not governed by it is unknowable, and we do not know what is governed and what is not governed by it, so it does not fulfill the requirements of the purpose for which we've established that it is needed. This rules out all religions wherein the deity is impotent, including Hindu, Norse, and Sumerian gods.
We know that the Logos must be observable, but it can't be the physical world and universe, nor can it be completely described as a part of the physical world and universe. We have to be able to observe it because otherwise we don't know that it exists; it can't be the physical world because the physical world is the thing that limits us and establishes a need for a Logos. That rules out a large chunk of the "New Age" religions, including all of those which depend on humanism.
The Logos must have revealed itself to everyone, or else we don't know if it has revealed itself to us or not. The Logos must have revealed itself to us in a way that supersedes our ability to observe its revelation; because otherwise we are again ultimately relying on our ability to observe, and therefore the Logos has not revealed anything to us at all, and we cannot rely on it. This means that everyone equally knows about this Logos, and nobody has an excuse to not know it.
The Logos must have actively revealed itself to us -- not passively. Or else we do not know when a thing we have discovered is the Logos, and when it is not the Logos. This means that the Logos has a will, and therefore has intentions. This rules out every religion wherein the Logos does not have a will of its own, including naturalism, much of the remaining "New Age" religions, Wicca, and most branches of "witchcraft".
The will and self-imposed purpose of the Logos must be self-consistent. This means that there is only one will, or at least that if there are multiple wills then they are all 100% subservient to the one will, and therefore there is only one Logos. This rules out polytheism, including tritheism, but not necessarily trinitarianism.
The revelations of the Logos must be consistent with one another, and it can never have lied to us. It also can never have changed its mind without fulfilling the requirements of its previous intention. Furthermore, the immaterial revelations of the Logos must be available to everyone, in all history, unceasingly. That rules out Mormonism, Jehova's Witnesses, and any branch of Christianity wherein there was a "prophet" whose prophesy was false or disagreed with another prophet's prophesy, or wherein there is supposed to have been an apostasy, or else there's ultimately no way for us to know that we are not still apostate, because for many centuries people have experienced the influence and revelations of a Logos in their lives.
The Logos must have a reason for everything it does. If the Logos ever acts without reason, then its revelations are inconsistent. Since we've established that it must have revealed itself, then that means that it must have had a reason for revealing itself. That means that the Logos "wanted", for some reason, to be revealed to us, which means that it desires to be known by us. Since the Logos has desires, it means that it has a character. The above requirements collectively rule out an "impersonal God".
Since the Logos must have revealed itself, for the reasons above, it is very likely that at least one of the major religions has it right. However, if more than one of the major religions has it right, then they must be so consistent with one another that it is extremely unlikely that two such religions exist.
The above list is not "complete" or "comprehensive". It is, I think, the logical conclusion to a world where we presuppose that knowledge is possible. Without the above, there can be no science. Unless all of the above requirements are met, we have no foundation for our knowledge, and therefore can not be confident in knowing anything, and therefore we have no absolute truth, and therefore as far as we are concerned there is no truth, and can we know nothing.
Is there any religion which meets the above requirements? I am only aware of one.
"Let me put you on hold for just a quick second."
In case you're jumping into my blog for the first time here, I'm working on a sort of "series", where I have attempted to throw away my presuppositions as much as is possible for me, and I have attempted to rebuild a framework wherein I can live and approach life with a certain measure of confidence (just enough to justify me in living and acting at all). That is to say, my goal ended up clarifying itself down to this: "to only allow myself one presupposition -- knowledge is possible". If knowledge is not possible, then I cannot build a presupposition, or any supposition for that matter.
The following are the dates of the posts which comprise this series:
May 18, 2014
June 2, 2014
June 4, 2014
June 10, 2014
June 11, 2014
November 15, 2014
December 20, 2014
On June 10, I hit a dead-end, which I spent a lot of time thinking about and attempting to recover from. A few times I thought I had an answer, but I didn't want to put it down until I had something I could be sure of. I, in my pride, clumsily attempted to recover from it in my post on June 11, but really I wasn't sure how to proceed. Here I confess that pride to my few readers and apologize for putting up a false confidence.
Now, I can boldly and confidently deliver an answer to you, because I have found the answer. Instead of asserting a point of view, I have attempted to deduce a set of requirements which must be met by any point of view, and then attempted to build a viable point of view with them as a foundation.
So, last time I wrote here, I think I established a need for a Logos. The idea was, "Either there's a Logos, or we can't be sure of anything we know"; and by consequence, "If we can't be sure of anything we know, then we don't know anything. Nothing is certain. There is no truth." That is, within the framework established by my previous posts, we have this Logos. The Logos exists, but we haven't established our ability to know anything yet, necessarily. At the end of my last post, we're similar to agnostic.
At this point, when I say "truth" and "Logos", I am referring to the truth that we've been searching for in all the past posts in the series. Therefore, in the posts following this one, I might make statements that seem circular, such as when answering the question, "How do we know that the Logos exists?", my answer will encompass the lengthy explanations I've already given, so that I don't have to repeat it all. The answer might be: "The Logos exists because the truth exists, and the truth exists because the Logos exists.". This statement seems fallaciously circular if you haven't read my previous posts.
OK OK Here we go -- the meat of the post starts here:
I want to see what we can discover about this Logos simply by deduction (based on the presupposition that "knowledge is possible", or "knowledge of truth is possible"), and by fitting it into the framework that we've established is necessary for the existence of truth and reliability of observation. So, remember: The reason a Logos is necessary is because without it we can't have absolute truth; and nothing can be known. That means that by taking on this endeavor, we've already established that we are not accepting religions wherein there is no Logos, or the Logos is potentially unknowable, such as Atheism, Agnosticism, Buddhism and Gnosticism.
We know that the Logos must be internally consistent, or else it is not a good foundation on which to build truth, and it does not fulfill the purpose for which we've established it is necessary for Logos to exist. That rules out every religion wherein a deity has either lied or been inconsistent; this includes most of the religions established in Europe and Asia, including the Roman and Greek gods.
The Logos must govern everything, and be consistent with everything. If it doesn't govern and consist with everything, then that thing which is not governed by it is unknowable, and we do not know what is governed and what is not governed by it, so it does not fulfill the requirements of the purpose for which we've established that it is needed. This rules out all religions wherein the deity is impotent, including Hindu, Norse, and Sumerian gods.
We know that the Logos must be observable, but it can't be the physical world and universe, nor can it be completely described as a part of the physical world and universe. We have to be able to observe it because otherwise we don't know that it exists; it can't be the physical world because the physical world is the thing that limits us and establishes a need for a Logos. That rules out a large chunk of the "New Age" religions, including all of those which depend on humanism.
The Logos must have revealed itself to everyone, or else we don't know if it has revealed itself to us or not. The Logos must have revealed itself to us in a way that supersedes our ability to observe its revelation; because otherwise we are again ultimately relying on our ability to observe, and therefore the Logos has not revealed anything to us at all, and we cannot rely on it. This means that everyone equally knows about this Logos, and nobody has an excuse to not know it.
The Logos must have actively revealed itself to us -- not passively. Or else we do not know when a thing we have discovered is the Logos, and when it is not the Logos. This means that the Logos has a will, and therefore has intentions. This rules out every religion wherein the Logos does not have a will of its own, including naturalism, much of the remaining "New Age" religions, Wicca, and most branches of "witchcraft".
The will and self-imposed purpose of the Logos must be self-consistent. This means that there is only one will, or at least that if there are multiple wills then they are all 100% subservient to the one will, and therefore there is only one Logos. This rules out polytheism, including tritheism, but not necessarily trinitarianism.
The revelations of the Logos must be consistent with one another, and it can never have lied to us. It also can never have changed its mind without fulfilling the requirements of its previous intention. Furthermore, the immaterial revelations of the Logos must be available to everyone, in all history, unceasingly. That rules out Mormonism, Jehova's Witnesses, and any branch of Christianity wherein there was a "prophet" whose prophesy was false or disagreed with another prophet's prophesy, or wherein there is supposed to have been an apostasy, or else there's ultimately no way for us to know that we are not still apostate, because for many centuries people have experienced the influence and revelations of a Logos in their lives.
The Logos must have a reason for everything it does. If the Logos ever acts without reason, then its revelations are inconsistent. Since we've established that it must have revealed itself, then that means that it must have had a reason for revealing itself. That means that the Logos "wanted", for some reason, to be revealed to us, which means that it desires to be known by us. Since the Logos has desires, it means that it has a character. The above requirements collectively rule out an "impersonal God".
Since the Logos must have revealed itself, for the reasons above, it is very likely that at least one of the major religions has it right. However, if more than one of the major religions has it right, then they must be so consistent with one another that it is extremely unlikely that two such religions exist.
The above list is not "complete" or "comprehensive". It is, I think, the logical conclusion to a world where we presuppose that knowledge is possible. Without the above, there can be no science. Unless all of the above requirements are met, we have no foundation for our knowledge, and therefore can not be confident in knowing anything, and therefore we have no absolute truth, and therefore as far as we are concerned there is no truth, and can we know nothing.
Is there any religion which meets the above requirements? I am only aware of one.
"Let me put you on hold for just a quick second."
Saturday, November 15, 2014
Alright, so I think it's time to continue that series I was working on (if not finish it... maybe not. this isn't an easy topic to elaborate on). I'm actually [insert excuse here] so I'm very tired and I might go to bed soon.
Give me a few minutes -- I'm gonna read up on my prior posts related to this, so I know where we left off. It's been a while.
...
Oh btw -- I really miss seasons.
Ok. It looks like I got stopped on point 3 of my outline on June 2, 2014. To save you some time, here are the bullets:
1. Elaborate on previous post
2. Establish existence of truth
3. Establish my own ability to observe reality
4. Examine truths which are substantially evidenced by observation alone
5. Finalize foundation for worldview; draft and summarize.
I think that I established that "something" is true. And the truth I established was basically just that "something". That's it. "Something" is all there is that we can know to be true at the bottom. I didn't say it in those words, but that was the idea I was trying to lead you to. I'll clarify this a little bit more later.
I then left off with the question, how do we know that 1+1=2 and not 1+1=[arbitrary]?
I took a long break for [excuse], but during the break I read some Cicero. In Cicero's letter to his son, he talked about one of his favorite philosophers, whose name I forget, who wrote a great series and posed some great questions, and claimed to be laying out [I think it was 3] points, but never actually wrote the [3rd] point. Cicero spent a lot of time talking about why that 3rd point was omitted, and it made me realize that I really ought to finish this before I die.
Ok. So at the very bottom, where we just know that things are happening, but we have no idea how to interpret it, we run into a paradox. I proposed that something ought to have intrinsic value, and that perhaps we should just "pick" something, but the more I thought about this, the more I realized it was a bad idea. Even if you choose "human life", you run into gray areas, such as if a person is suffering, or has inferior genes etc.. and ultimately, if you're a philosophical purist, you have disappointingly left unanswered the question, "Why choose that?".
But then even more basic than that is the issue, "why do we trust our senses enough to know that we are even interpreting logic correctly?", and the first answer that comes to mind is "Because they're all we have.". This is a frustrating and lazy answer, really. I propose that we can do better. The issue with that, though, is that any answer we come up with operates on this fundamental assumption: that is that we are coherent enough to have generated an answer at all -- one that even addresses the question, or anything, if it even is an answer and not something else. That is the paradox, how can you know anything? Well, you don't know, and if you did, then how would you know that that knowledge was something you can know? You need an answer that can justify itself. The answer must be circular.
I'm here, trying to figure this out, aren't I? Or am I? You might say, well, we know that the truth is "something", and so that must give us some kind of foundation to build on, right? Well, it would, except that it's just "something", and it really isn't "anything".
So I was at a dead end, and I re-looked at my process. Perhaps I was approaching this wrong. Perhaps I was doing this out of order.... And long story short I came to what I think is a viable explanation of existence, not from a "scientific" perspective, since science is nothing if we cannot reliably observe that we exist and will continue to exist, and that our memories of past existence are legitimate; the explanation must be philosophical.
Step 3 is impossible. Step 4 relies on steps 2 and 3. Therefore, we have to skip to step 5. I cannot establish my own ability to observe reality, so I have to look for something else to establish it for me. First, I attempt to interpret my physical senses, and I find that nothing is self evident except that "something."
"Something"....
The answer is that I need a reliable source. If I am just brief explosion of vibrating energy, then my perceptions are invalid. I have to start with a presupposition. However, giving something "intrinsic value" does not answer the question of "why know that I exist?". It only answers, "what do I do about it?".
So then, I must formulate a presupposition which is firm enough to provide a basis for observable self-evidence. That is the "why?" for whichever model of presupposition is developed here; my goal is not to choose from among the presuppositions presented me by the world around me, but to generate one on my own -- which is arguably impossible to do without some bias towards a certain perspective, but I think that I have reason to believe that what I've invented is not only true, but may have invented me before I invented it.
Should I choose to simply say that my observations are reliable, and use that as my presupposition, then I run into an issue: Should I choose to believe that only the material exists, then I am only a material, and my senses are not only decidedly unreliable, but also bear an extremely high likelihood of having been completely misinterpreted by me. My senses must be completely false. The universe is huge and complex; given an infinite number of possibilities, the likelihood of my "consciousness" being capable of understanding its surroundings, coexisting in near time and near space with a similar consciousness, and also interpreting those things correctly, is extremely small. It is staggeringly more likely that I am imagining the existence of other consciousnesses, and that I am one of several odd arrangements of energy densities in a cloud, each occurring multiple infinities of time apart from one another. I'll disappear like I appeared, and there might never be, or have been, another consciousness apart from me. Back to earth, the implication of this is that I have no responsibilities (moral or otherwise), or that if I say that I have responsibilities, then I'm just playing along with my imagination world (the one where I imagine that I have responsibilities), and I really much more likely don't have responsibilities.
Should I choose, however, to believe that something immaterial exists -- logic (here it comes: "Logos"), outside of the dimension and time-space wherein this energy swishes and collides with itself, (if "energy" is even adequate to describe it,) then that Logos must at least know what's going on here.
Ok, so there was that leap I was talking about before, from atheism to agnosticism. We finished step 5 -- the next, most reasonable step must be 3... right?
I thought about this with a silly amount of depth during highschool. I really didn't come up with a satisfactory articulation of it until relatively recently, but now I think that in highschool I really did take the Descartes rout, and I held onto enough of my "assumed" worldview to allow myself to be busy in the physical world without breaking too many customs.
Looks like I'm not finishing today after all.
"Now I'm just a candle trying to stay lit in this windy night"
Give me a few minutes -- I'm gonna read up on my prior posts related to this, so I know where we left off. It's been a while.
...
Oh btw -- I really miss seasons.
Ok. It looks like I got stopped on point 3 of my outline on June 2, 2014. To save you some time, here are the bullets:
1. Elaborate on previous post
2. Establish existence of truth
3. Establish my own ability to observe reality
4. Examine truths which are substantially evidenced by observation alone
5. Finalize foundation for worldview; draft and summarize.
I think that I established that "something" is true. And the truth I established was basically just that "something". That's it. "Something" is all there is that we can know to be true at the bottom. I didn't say it in those words, but that was the idea I was trying to lead you to. I'll clarify this a little bit more later.
I then left off with the question, how do we know that 1+1=2 and not 1+1=[arbitrary]?
I took a long break for [excuse], but during the break I read some Cicero. In Cicero's letter to his son, he talked about one of his favorite philosophers, whose name I forget, who wrote a great series and posed some great questions, and claimed to be laying out [I think it was 3] points, but never actually wrote the [3rd] point. Cicero spent a lot of time talking about why that 3rd point was omitted, and it made me realize that I really ought to finish this before I die.
Ok. So at the very bottom, where we just know that things are happening, but we have no idea how to interpret it, we run into a paradox. I proposed that something ought to have intrinsic value, and that perhaps we should just "pick" something, but the more I thought about this, the more I realized it was a bad idea. Even if you choose "human life", you run into gray areas, such as if a person is suffering, or has inferior genes etc.. and ultimately, if you're a philosophical purist, you have disappointingly left unanswered the question, "Why choose that?".
But then even more basic than that is the issue, "why do we trust our senses enough to know that we are even interpreting logic correctly?", and the first answer that comes to mind is "Because they're all we have.". This is a frustrating and lazy answer, really. I propose that we can do better. The issue with that, though, is that any answer we come up with operates on this fundamental assumption: that is that we are coherent enough to have generated an answer at all -- one that even addresses the question, or anything, if it even is an answer and not something else. That is the paradox, how can you know anything? Well, you don't know, and if you did, then how would you know that that knowledge was something you can know? You need an answer that can justify itself. The answer must be circular.
I'm here, trying to figure this out, aren't I? Or am I? You might say, well, we know that the truth is "something", and so that must give us some kind of foundation to build on, right? Well, it would, except that it's just "something", and it really isn't "anything".
So I was at a dead end, and I re-looked at my process. Perhaps I was approaching this wrong. Perhaps I was doing this out of order.... And long story short I came to what I think is a viable explanation of existence, not from a "scientific" perspective, since science is nothing if we cannot reliably observe that we exist and will continue to exist, and that our memories of past existence are legitimate; the explanation must be philosophical.
Step 3 is impossible. Step 4 relies on steps 2 and 3. Therefore, we have to skip to step 5. I cannot establish my own ability to observe reality, so I have to look for something else to establish it for me. First, I attempt to interpret my physical senses, and I find that nothing is self evident except that "something."
"Something"....
The answer is that I need a reliable source. If I am just brief explosion of vibrating energy, then my perceptions are invalid. I have to start with a presupposition. However, giving something "intrinsic value" does not answer the question of "why know that I exist?". It only answers, "what do I do about it?".
So then, I must formulate a presupposition which is firm enough to provide a basis for observable self-evidence. That is the "why?" for whichever model of presupposition is developed here; my goal is not to choose from among the presuppositions presented me by the world around me, but to generate one on my own -- which is arguably impossible to do without some bias towards a certain perspective, but I think that I have reason to believe that what I've invented is not only true, but may have invented me before I invented it.
Should I choose to simply say that my observations are reliable, and use that as my presupposition, then I run into an issue: Should I choose to believe that only the material exists, then I am only a material, and my senses are not only decidedly unreliable, but also bear an extremely high likelihood of having been completely misinterpreted by me. My senses must be completely false. The universe is huge and complex; given an infinite number of possibilities, the likelihood of my "consciousness" being capable of understanding its surroundings, coexisting in near time and near space with a similar consciousness, and also interpreting those things correctly, is extremely small. It is staggeringly more likely that I am imagining the existence of other consciousnesses, and that I am one of several odd arrangements of energy densities in a cloud, each occurring multiple infinities of time apart from one another. I'll disappear like I appeared, and there might never be, or have been, another consciousness apart from me. Back to earth, the implication of this is that I have no responsibilities (moral or otherwise), or that if I say that I have responsibilities, then I'm just playing along with my imagination world (the one where I imagine that I have responsibilities), and I really much more likely don't have responsibilities.
Should I choose, however, to believe that something immaterial exists -- logic (here it comes: "Logos"), outside of the dimension and time-space wherein this energy swishes and collides with itself, (if "energy" is even adequate to describe it,) then that Logos must at least know what's going on here.
Ok, so there was that leap I was talking about before, from atheism to agnosticism. We finished step 5 -- the next, most reasonable step must be 3... right?
I thought about this with a silly amount of depth during highschool. I really didn't come up with a satisfactory articulation of it until relatively recently, but now I think that in highschool I really did take the Descartes rout, and I held onto enough of my "assumed" worldview to allow myself to be busy in the physical world without breaking too many customs.
Looks like I'm not finishing today after all.
"Now I'm just a candle trying to stay lit in this windy night"
Monday, November 10, 2014
Alright guys. Here's a story I wrote. I'm gonna fine tune it later, but I don't want to forget my initial perspective on a particular topic. When I learn more about it, I might lean one way or another, but this story has some back story that I don't really want to write outright atm. I would prefer to just put it down as an analogy or a parable, sortof, to get my thoughts in writing.
OK. So there's this baker, named Yoshi. He's a dark-skinned guy from the Mediterranean, he's an excellent cook, and he runs a successful business. So successful, in fact, that he has lots of time and resources to personally promote his business.
Yoshi's specialty product is a delicious muffin. It's the most satisfying muffin there is. In fact, it's so good, that many people who have tried it say that it is the only muffin that has ever satisfied them at all. They just didn't know what it felt like to be satisfied prior to eating this muffin.
Yoshi has spent most of his time giving away this muffin for free, and everyone who ate it got to know Yoshi and was invited to come in and have more of his delicious produce. He would walk around town with a cart full of free muffins, and many people were coming to know and love his muffins. Often people would take multiple muffins with them, and hand the muffins out to anyone who would take them, because the muffins were delicious. Yoshi's regular customers firmly believed that nobody should ever live their whole life without trying Yoshi's muffins.
There was a running debate among his regular constituents as to whether he was the Yoshi who gives muffins to you, or the Yoshi who you take muffins from. Some people who didn't know Yoshi well, or who had not met him in person but had still tasted the muffin, would occasionally argue about whether Yoshi was calling people to eat his muffins, or if people were going to get them. In some cases, the debate became so deeply founded that people began to wonder if Yoshi's customers were talking about two different Yoshis. Some of the people who had not met Yoshi, but had tasted his muffins, thought that Yoshi was only the Yoshi who gives, and everyone else was talking about the wrong Yoshi. Others thought that Yoshi was only the Yoshi who you take from, and everyone else was talking about the wrong Yoshi. It didn't help that occasionally someone would come along and claim to be the true Yoshi, sometimes with some success, but most often without, as only Yoshi's muffins were truly satisfying.
However, among these people who had tried Yoshi's muffins and argued about his character, they were ultimately talking about the same Yoshi, just from different perspectives. They would not even know how to have the debate if they had not first tried his muffins anyway.
Eventually, there came a small and ambitious group of people who took some of Yoshi's muffins and did not eat them. They hadn't tasted the muffins, but knew by the smell that these muffins were too good to be free. So, instead, they took the muffins down the road and around the block to another part of town, where they set up a small stand with the muffins on display. They called people over saying, "why trust some guy giving muffins away for free on the side of the road?! These muffins are legitimate -- just look at the price tag and see for yourself. They are more legitimate and more delicious than Yoshi's free produce" The muffins were so exorbitantly priced that nobody on earth could afford them. Nobody in the history or the future of humanity would ever be able to afford them.
When people came and asked, "how can I get one of those delicious looking muffins? The price tag seems so steep!" They would respond, "The price tag is not as bad as it seems. You can come work for us, and in addition to your pay you will earn muffin credits. Eventually, if you earn enough muffin credits, you can cash them in for one of these delicious muffins. If you work very hard, we will teach you the secret recipe, so that you can make them yourself. However, if you ever stop working, you will lose all your muffin credits and have to start over."
The people came and worked hard to earn muffin credits. Eventually, however, their bodies would fail them and they would stop working, and in that moment they would lose all their muffin credits. They continued working, however, more diligently and with more strength all the time, but nobody ever gained enough muffin credits to get a muffin. Eventually, the untasted muffins on display began to get moldy. At first, the con artists would cut the mold off, but after a while the muffins became so disfigured that they were unrecognizable and completely unappealing, so that the cons hid the muffins from sight.
The people who worked for those muffins wanted the secret recipe badly, and they were decieved into thinking that Yoshi's muffins were not satisfactory. So they worked and worked until they had no energy to even reach for Yoshi's muffins. All this deeply troubled Yoshi, but Yoshi's business was still successful, and he did not deviate from his business model, because it worked. Occasionally, someone from the false muffin stand would collapse and be completely unable to work, and Yoshi would rescue them and give them a taste of the good muffins. Many people who were tricked into thinking Yoshi's muffins were not satisfactory would refuse to taste his muffins at all, saying that they were working for a better muffin. Often, people would die without ever tasting Yoshi's delicious muffins.
It's not a perfect metaphor, obviously, but it touches on several issues that I'm handling right now. I'm gonna go have a muffin.
"We're praying for you."
OK. So there's this baker, named Yoshi. He's a dark-skinned guy from the Mediterranean, he's an excellent cook, and he runs a successful business. So successful, in fact, that he has lots of time and resources to personally promote his business.
Yoshi's specialty product is a delicious muffin. It's the most satisfying muffin there is. In fact, it's so good, that many people who have tried it say that it is the only muffin that has ever satisfied them at all. They just didn't know what it felt like to be satisfied prior to eating this muffin.
Yoshi has spent most of his time giving away this muffin for free, and everyone who ate it got to know Yoshi and was invited to come in and have more of his delicious produce. He would walk around town with a cart full of free muffins, and many people were coming to know and love his muffins. Often people would take multiple muffins with them, and hand the muffins out to anyone who would take them, because the muffins were delicious. Yoshi's regular customers firmly believed that nobody should ever live their whole life without trying Yoshi's muffins.
There was a running debate among his regular constituents as to whether he was the Yoshi who gives muffins to you, or the Yoshi who you take muffins from. Some people who didn't know Yoshi well, or who had not met him in person but had still tasted the muffin, would occasionally argue about whether Yoshi was calling people to eat his muffins, or if people were going to get them. In some cases, the debate became so deeply founded that people began to wonder if Yoshi's customers were talking about two different Yoshis. Some of the people who had not met Yoshi, but had tasted his muffins, thought that Yoshi was only the Yoshi who gives, and everyone else was talking about the wrong Yoshi. Others thought that Yoshi was only the Yoshi who you take from, and everyone else was talking about the wrong Yoshi. It didn't help that occasionally someone would come along and claim to be the true Yoshi, sometimes with some success, but most often without, as only Yoshi's muffins were truly satisfying.
However, among these people who had tried Yoshi's muffins and argued about his character, they were ultimately talking about the same Yoshi, just from different perspectives. They would not even know how to have the debate if they had not first tried his muffins anyway.
Eventually, there came a small and ambitious group of people who took some of Yoshi's muffins and did not eat them. They hadn't tasted the muffins, but knew by the smell that these muffins were too good to be free. So, instead, they took the muffins down the road and around the block to another part of town, where they set up a small stand with the muffins on display. They called people over saying, "why trust some guy giving muffins away for free on the side of the road?! These muffins are legitimate -- just look at the price tag and see for yourself. They are more legitimate and more delicious than Yoshi's free produce" The muffins were so exorbitantly priced that nobody on earth could afford them. Nobody in the history or the future of humanity would ever be able to afford them.
When people came and asked, "how can I get one of those delicious looking muffins? The price tag seems so steep!" They would respond, "The price tag is not as bad as it seems. You can come work for us, and in addition to your pay you will earn muffin credits. Eventually, if you earn enough muffin credits, you can cash them in for one of these delicious muffins. If you work very hard, we will teach you the secret recipe, so that you can make them yourself. However, if you ever stop working, you will lose all your muffin credits and have to start over."
The people came and worked hard to earn muffin credits. Eventually, however, their bodies would fail them and they would stop working, and in that moment they would lose all their muffin credits. They continued working, however, more diligently and with more strength all the time, but nobody ever gained enough muffin credits to get a muffin. Eventually, the untasted muffins on display began to get moldy. At first, the con artists would cut the mold off, but after a while the muffins became so disfigured that they were unrecognizable and completely unappealing, so that the cons hid the muffins from sight.
The people who worked for those muffins wanted the secret recipe badly, and they were decieved into thinking that Yoshi's muffins were not satisfactory. So they worked and worked until they had no energy to even reach for Yoshi's muffins. All this deeply troubled Yoshi, but Yoshi's business was still successful, and he did not deviate from his business model, because it worked. Occasionally, someone from the false muffin stand would collapse and be completely unable to work, and Yoshi would rescue them and give them a taste of the good muffins. Many people who were tricked into thinking Yoshi's muffins were not satisfactory would refuse to taste his muffins at all, saying that they were working for a better muffin. Often, people would die without ever tasting Yoshi's delicious muffins.
It's not a perfect metaphor, obviously, but it touches on several issues that I'm handling right now. I'm gonna go have a muffin.
"We're praying for you."
Tuesday, October 28, 2014
Looks like Google lost the header on my blog. I just fixed it. I like this header.
I'm watching the Walking Dead right now. "Everybody else is doing it". It's pretty interesting, but I have to admit I'm a bit put off by how there's a cliffhanger at the end of every episode. I assume that the people in the show are intended to represent a sample of the average southeastern population. It somehow reminds me of the type of illogical thinking that seems to be all-but taught in school nowadays.
Lets have a school council that never does anything important -- that pretty much hits the nail on the head as to why student councils are instantiated. I'm pretty sure it teaches them exactly how much a representative of the people can actually do for the people. How about lets teach kids "evolution, but not any other worldview, because we're so damned open minded." As if other worldviews are "obviously false", because it's not like 80% of the world is deist or anything. We can satisfy their parents by telling the kids once at the beginning of class, "it's just a theory.", and following up with, "just like germ theory, and the cardiorespiratory theory, and the theory of gravity.". Because all theories have equal merit, and our closed-mindedness to opposing theories may as well negate their existence. [I'm not about to make this post about why science is the modern day Vatican; but I'll write about it if someone asks] How about lets teach kids math only one way everywhere, because this way will definitely reach every learning style, and the teachers are not intelligent or coherent enough to look at their kids and see who's learning and how, and try to meet the kids at their level. We'd better hand out birth control and condoms to teenagers, because we've given up on morality and these kids aren't smart enough to take responsibility for their own actions (nobody ever waited until marriage to have sex anyway -- that was a myth). For that matter, everybody has to obey the dress code except for the cheerleaders, and also all the other girls sports teams. Oh and I almost forgot to mention: those kids better get into the habit of extrapolating 3 sentence ideas into 5 pages, because that's what their bosses will want.
I've got the end to that series all thought out and worded in my head. I'll see if I can get to posting it tomorrow.
Oh oh. And I've decided to start looking for a pottery class in Phoenix. If any of my nonexistent readers knows one, let me know.
"Well how do you know that?"
P.S. Everybody please feed Fido. He's at the bottom of the page. Food is available by holding your mouse over "more".
I'm watching the Walking Dead right now. "Everybody else is doing it". It's pretty interesting, but I have to admit I'm a bit put off by how there's a cliffhanger at the end of every episode. I assume that the people in the show are intended to represent a sample of the average southeastern population. It somehow reminds me of the type of illogical thinking that seems to be all-but taught in school nowadays.
Lets have a school council that never does anything important -- that pretty much hits the nail on the head as to why student councils are instantiated. I'm pretty sure it teaches them exactly how much a representative of the people can actually do for the people. How about lets teach kids "evolution, but not any other worldview, because we're so damned open minded." As if other worldviews are "obviously false", because it's not like 80% of the world is deist or anything. We can satisfy their parents by telling the kids once at the beginning of class, "it's just a theory.", and following up with, "just like germ theory, and the cardiorespiratory theory, and the theory of gravity.". Because all theories have equal merit, and our closed-mindedness to opposing theories may as well negate their existence. [I'm not about to make this post about why science is the modern day Vatican; but I'll write about it if someone asks] How about lets teach kids math only one way everywhere, because this way will definitely reach every learning style, and the teachers are not intelligent or coherent enough to look at their kids and see who's learning and how, and try to meet the kids at their level. We'd better hand out birth control and condoms to teenagers, because we've given up on morality and these kids aren't smart enough to take responsibility for their own actions (nobody ever waited until marriage to have sex anyway -- that was a myth). For that matter, everybody has to obey the dress code except for the cheerleaders, and also all the other girls sports teams. Oh and I almost forgot to mention: those kids better get into the habit of extrapolating 3 sentence ideas into 5 pages, because that's what their bosses will want.
I've got the end to that series all thought out and worded in my head. I'll see if I can get to posting it tomorrow.
Oh oh. And I've decided to start looking for a pottery class in Phoenix. If any of my nonexistent readers knows one, let me know.
"Well how do you know that?"
P.S. Everybody please feed Fido. He's at the bottom of the page. Food is available by holding your mouse over "more".
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