Reality is a Rainbow

[coberst]

Reality is a Rainbow

 

Is there a demarcation boundary between instinct and reason? Is there a demarcation boundary between anything between here and the Big Bang? Is demarcation boundary a part of nature or is it a necessity of human comprehension? Is category a fact of nature or is category a necessity of human comprehension? Is anything different in kind from anything else? Is everything different only in degree from everything else?

 

I conclude that demarcation boundary is not an essential characteristic of nature but is an essential characteristic of human comprehension. Everything is a seamless flow from the Big Bang to now. Only in our mind do we have a difference in kind.

 

I wrote the first two paragraphs of the OP several days ago and only 24 hours later did I fall off my horse. Lightening struck and I realized, finally, what I had written. This realization has led to a large number of connections for me. I was convinced of certain fragments of knowledge and only when I was knocked off my horse did I find these fragments became a synthesis that I shall have to realize by writing more essays.

 

 

To recognize as true that reality is a rainbow allows me to comprehend the error of classical metaphysical realism, which is the foundation of Western society’s comprehension of reality. This may not be true for you but it is true for me.

 

Reality is a rainbow but we humans perceive reality as a myriad of containers! We perceive reality as containers because our “gut” tells us so and because classical metaphysics tells us so. Reality without demarcation boundaries means that everything is a seamless reality from everything else. It means that everything is not a kind of thing with its own necessary and sufficient nature but that all reality runs together and it is only in our minds that these containers exist.

[CraigD]

Reality without demarcation boundaries means that everything is a seamless reality from everything else. It means that everything is not a kind of thing with its own necessary and sufficient nature but that all reality runs together and it is only in our minds that these containers exist.

I think I get what you mean about the seamless, interconnected nature of reality, and agree. However, the idea that demarcation is an essential characteristic only of human comprehension, not of nature, is subject to a Russell’s paradox, which I think is best illustrated by Royce/Korzybski/Borges metaphor.

 

By definition, reality contains everything, including our minds. That our minds contain “containers”, but reality does not, is a categorical contradiction.

[coberst]

I think I get what you mean about the seamless, interconnected nature of reality, and agree. However, the idea that demarcation is an essential characteristic only of human comprehension, not of nature, is subject to a Russell’s paradox, which I think is best illustrated by Royce/Korzybski/Borges metaphor.

 

By definition, reality contains everything, including our minds. That our minds contain “containers”, but reality does not, is a categorical contradiction.

 

 

 

Western philosophy emerged in the sixth century BC along the Ionian coast. A small group of scientist-philosophers began writing about their attempts to develop “rational” accounts regarding human experience. These early Pre-Socratic thinkers thought that they were dealing with fundamental elements of nature.

 

It is natural for humans to seek knowledge. In the “Metaphysics” Aristotle wrote “All men by nature desire to know”.

 

The attempt to seek knowledge presupposes that the world unfolds in a systematic pattern and that we can gain knowledge of that unfolding. Cognitive science identifies several ideas that seem to come naturally to us and labels such ideas as “Folk Theories”.

 

The Folk Theory of the Intelligibility of the World

The world makes systematic sense, and we can gain knowledge of it.

 

The Folk Theory of General Kinds

Every particular thing is a kind of thing.

 

The Folk Theory of Essences

Every entity has an “essence” or “nature,” that is, a collection of properties that makes it the kind of thing it is and that is the causal source of its natural behavior.

 

The consequences of the two theories of kinds and essences is:

 

The Foundational Assumption of Metaphysics

Kinds exist and are defined by essences.

 

We may not want our friends to know this fact but we are all metaphysicians. We, in fact, assume that things have a nature thereby we are led by the metaphysical impulse to seek knowledge at various levels of reality.

 

Cognitive science has uncovered these ideas they have labeled as Folk Theories. Such theories when compared to sophisticated philosophical theories are like comparing mountain music with classical music. Such theories seem to come naturally to human consciousness.

[Tarantism]

I conclude that demarcation boundary is not an essential characteristic of nature but is an essential characteristic of human comprehension. Everything is a seamless flow from the Big Bang to now. Only in our mind do we have a difference in kind.

 

i completely agree here. but i do not know if you are looking at this in a negative light or not...we as humans are infact weak in the sense that we cannot comprehend infinity completely, and so we much take everything is "doses". the standard dose of comprehension for a human is different, but i think that as a whole trying to look at this reality as a whole is overwhelmingly difficult if not impossible. i belive this is why we break it up.

 

while reality is infact very smooth, there are holes in reality as we know it...black holes and dark matter i think are examples of this. one thing that intrests me is what is on the other side.

[InfiniteNow]

i do not know if you are looking at this in a negative light or not...we as humans are infact weak in the sense that we cannot comprehend infinity completely

Perhaps infinity is all we comprehend, but we struggle to parse it... to communicate it... :eek:

[Tarantism]

maybe we can understand infinity, but we cannot comprehend it. therefore we break it up into lesser portions in order to get comprehension?

[hallenrm]

I read the word reality several times in this thread. It led me to think "what exactly is reality? Is it universal and objective or largely subjective?

 

I think the reality perceived by individuals is largely subjective. It is based on personal experiences and hence personal knowledge. Since personal knowledge can never be all encompassing, the overall reality perceived by two different individuals is seldom exactly the same. The reality perceived by different individuals in a society is subject to leveling because of communication. Individuals when they communicate with one another help in expanding each others reality.

 

Have I been successful in communicating anything that makes sense to anybody here?

 

B)

[Tarantism]

yes, you have! i agree and i think that every individual experiences a seprate reality. this is how we get situations like misunderstanding, if that makes sense.

 

but, apart from the one reality that is apparent in first-person, waking life, i think that here is two other aspects of our consciouness, at least.

 

when we explore our surroundings we immidietly being to discern what is real and what isnt based on our sense and our perception...what we know to be real, what we have been taught is real and what we could imagine could be real. the imagination is a funny thing in this sense because, as far as im concerned, as soon as you imagine something you create a relm of possibility where what you have thought of as probable or possible could be real...and therefore while it has no "real" matter, it is real in some dimension of the mind's innerspace. another interesting fuction of reality is dreams. those of us who are dreamers...that is we practice the ancient art of lucid dreaming in our quest of consciousness, know also that there is a dream-fabric world where the known physical laws of this "reality" do not apply. we can fly, turn invisible, the possibilities are seemingly infinate. thsi suggests that there are at least three aspects to our reality, not only one. i think that narrowing it to only three would also not do this beautiful fabric of infinity justice.

 

do you think that these three aspects of consciousness are valid?

[hallenrm]

Again dear Tarantism you are compartmentalizing! Aren't you. Just think, isn't it true that all our imaginations and our dreams are somewhere based on our past experiences and knowledge. We imagine/dream only on the basis of what we have somewhere read/heard or even seen in a movie.

 

I repeat, the reality for each one of us is not exactly the same, it varies from person to person!! B)

[coberst]

I read the word reality several times in this thread. It led me to think "what exactly is reality? Is it universal and objective or largely subjective?

 

I think the reality perceived by individuals is largely subjective. It is based on personal experiences and hence personal knowledge. Since personal knowledge can never be all encompassing, the overall reality perceived by two different individuals is seldom exactly the same. The reality perceived by different individuals in a society is subject to leveling because of communication. Individuals when they communicate with one another help in expanding each others reality.

 

Have I been successful in communicating anything that makes sense to anybody here?

 

:)

 

I agree.

 

I would just add that our comprehension of reality is objective in the sense that each of us, as humans, comprehend the world in much the same way as a result of our biology.

 

Also what we comprehend is subjective in that we do add a great deal of individuality as a result of our different experiences in life. We cannot escape our biology and we cannot escape our experiences that have added to what we comprehend.