Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

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Advocate
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

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Atla wrote: Sun Feb 23, 2020 6:08 pm
Advocate wrote: Sun Feb 23, 2020 4:43 pmI mean that the meaning of transcendence is that which is beyond us. Beyond sensation or logical necessity. If there's anything like another universe, we cannot even formulate the slightest similarity to what that would be in our minds or words. A multiverse is an incoherent idea entirely. For our purposes the universe is everything there is, and only the verifiable bits are indistinguishable from fiction. The universe is infinite in every direction at every scale in every way. The solution to metaphysics is the same as the solution to physics - an understanding and set of maxims that adequately explain our experience of our part of it so as to provide actionable certainty. Positing transcendence is not an answer, it's a placeholder for an answer. The same rule applies to god etc. If it requires believing in something beyond measurement or logical necessity it's indistinguishable from fiction "for all intents and purposes".
Well, a universe that's infinite in every way (or rather some ways) is what people usually mean by an infinite multiverse. I guess in a way that's transcendence, but not supernatural.
But in this picture, the world we see around us is just one from the infinite possibilities. I'm sure you're aware of the cosmological fine-tuned universe problem? What use is a metaphysics that doesn't address the big questions?

>Multiverse must mean some variation on a universe which is not our own, with some boundary condition between ours and the Other. There is no reason to believe this is a) possible or b) actual. The fine-tuning problem is a misunderstanding of the question. If the universe was some other way than the way it is we wouldn't exist. That merely means that it isn't one of those other ways, not that our own way is in any sense unlikely. This is in fact the only possible universe as far as we can know and we're fine-tuned for it, not the other way around. We can't even speculate what anything other than the one we see might be with any sensible clarity.
They're simultaneous where they connect but the cause can begin before the effect and the effect can end after the cause, and not vice versa. It's not a metaphysical answer, it's a linguistic one. That's what we use the words to mean. There is a direct succession from the beginning of the universe to everything which is happening now and causality is how we explain our limited temporal window on that process.
That's how we live and how we describe the world using everyday language, sure, humans are bound to the arrow of time. But I meant that from an 'absolute' perspective, causes and effects are simultaneous, and obviously the universe didn't have a beginning.

>There is no absolute perspective. That's another variation of transcendence and transcendence literally cannot exist to us in any sense. From an imaginary perspective where change isn't universal and ongoing, sure...
>No. Although all metaphorical understandings are grounded in the physical at some lower layer, we distinguish certain ideas (favorite color, love, time, consciousness, experience, emotion, economics, etc.) from it because we don't use them in that narrowly defined sense. ex. Mind exists as an emergent understanding of patterns in the brain, although they're identical stuff underneath.
'Physical' is an idea just as 'mental' is, and they were invented in opposition to each other. All metaphysics grounded in a basic physical layer is wrong, in other words if A is identical to B, then A does not emerge from B.

>The physical is that which we access through our senses, including proprioception. Anything else is whatever isn't that. They aren't identical because we use the words for different purposes. That's why the metaphysical absolute is that every thing is a pattern with a purpose and the resolution of the purpose determines the resolution of the pattern. Outside our purposes it's just stuff doing stuff, not things existing in ways for reasons.
>I mean that our active awareness is the proper understanding of what consciousness and self are, and it is only capable of focusing on one idea at a time. Multitasking is actually rapidly moving between ideas, not paying attention to them simultaneously. We are subject to external distractions, internal Brownian motion, etc. all of which push our attention around just as much as what we intend.
Well this is usually true for men, not sure about women. They do usually have several lines of thought in awareness simultaneously, but they may be jumping between them extremely fast, anyway this is just some minor issue then.

>I believe this particular point has been empirically proven in neuroscience.
Atla
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

Post by Atla »

Advocate wrote: Mon Feb 24, 2020 5:49 amMultiverse must mean some variation on a universe which is not our own, with some boundary condition between ours and the Other. There is no reason to believe this is a) possible or b) actual. The fine-tuning problem is a misunderstanding of the question. If the universe was some other way than the way it is we wouldn't exist. That merely means that it isn't one of those other ways, not that our own way is in any sense unlikely. This is in fact the only possible universe as far as we can know and we're fine-tuned for it, not the other way around. We can't even speculate what anything other than the one we see might be with any sensible clarity.
An actual boundary isn't necessary, and we can extrapolate the possible parameters of other universes from the parameters of the one we see.
The fine-tuning problem is that only an incomprehensibly small set of parameters allow for life in the first place, which our universe happens to have. If we don't allow for the possibility of a multiverse (or God or whatever) then metaphysics remains arguably insoluble, because why did we win the galactic lottery.
There is no absolute perspective. That's another variation of transcendence and transcendence literally cannot exist to us in any sense. From an imaginary perspective where change isn't universal and ongoing, sure...
Of course, the absolute, objective perspective is just a useful ideal.
The physical is that which we access through our senses, including proprioception. Anything else is whatever isn't that. They aren't identical because we use the words for different purposes. That's why the metaphysical absolute is that every thing is a pattern with a purpose and the resolution of the purpose determines the resolution of the pattern. Outside our purposes it's just stuff doing stuff, not things existing in ways for reasons.
We tend to use them that way but the physical vs mental problem goes deeper than this, even if we view everything as patterns..
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

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An actual boundary isn't necessary, and we can extrapolate the possible parameters of other universes from the parameters of the one we see.
The fine-tuning problem is that only an incomprehensibly small set of parameters allow for life in the first place, which our universe happens to have. If we don't allow for the possibility of a multiverse (or God or whatever) then metaphysics remains arguably insoluble, because why did we win the galactic lottery.

>We can imagine the possible parameters if we first accept without evidence that Any options other than the one we've got is possible - that's pure imagination. Our understanding of even our own universe is minute. To say we can explore the possibilities of anything beyond it is insane. We didn't win the lottery because we didn't exist to care before it happened. We're cosmic accidents and there are no implications, spiritual or ethical, to our existence itself.

As for the material/spiritual divide, i dare say i've put more thought into it than anyone else ever and that relationship is the foundational understanding of everything in philosophy and human wisdom: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... Kbneo/edit Kant was pretty close. Sean Carrol (Yale) is pretty close. Hume was close but he's a terrible communicator.
Atla
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

Post by Atla »

Advocate wrote: Mon Feb 24, 2020 8:50 pm We can imagine the possible parameters if we first accept without evidence that Any options other than the one we've got is possible - that's pure imagination. Our understanding of even our own universe is minute. To say we can explore the possibilities of anything beyond it is insane. We didn't win the lottery because we didn't exist to care before it happened. We're cosmic accidents and there are no implications, spiritual or ethical, to our existence itself.
Of course we can't physically 'explore' the possibilities we can't explore. We can merely come up with guesses, and debate which guess is the simplest / most likely. But it can't be proven or disproven. (That's why metaphysics can't be fully solved.)

But the idea that we are cosmic accidents is almost infinitely unlikely, and can be dismissed. So looks like, by metaphysics you just mean the core of metaphysics that can be posited beyond reasonable doubt.
As for the material/spiritual divide, i dare say i've put more thought into it than anyone else ever and that relationship is the foundational understanding of everything in philosophy and human wisdom: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... Kbneo/edit Kant was pretty close. Sean Carrol (Yale) is pretty close. Hume was close but he's a terrible communicator.
The foundational understanding of everything in Western philosophy. But of course in reality there is no material/spiritual (I assume by spiritual you mean mental) divide at all, the two are one and the same, so in reality they have no relationship.
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

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>Of course we can't physically 'explore' the possibilities we can't explore. We can merely come up with guesses, and debate which guess is the simplest / most likely. But it can't be proven or disproven. (That's why metaphysics can't be fully solved.)

The answer to metaphysics is the same as the answer to physics or any complex phenomenon, a metaphor or set of maxims that allows for reasonable certainty and actionability, not something absolute, but even in a relative sense it can be absolutely better than any known alternative, so The Answer, is here: tiny.cc/TheThingIs. If there's a more comprehensive, more understandable, more logically necessary, more useful (etc.) version than that, it's the answer instead, but there isn't. Metaphysics is solved in that all possible metaphysical questions can be answered with that understanding. What "answered" means is a different question but also relatively simple.

>But the idea that we are cosmic accidents is almost infinitely unlikely, and can be dismissed. So looks like, by metaphysics you just mean the core of metaphysics that can be posited beyond reasonable doubt.

It's only unlikely if you first choose a specific desired outcome. As one of infinite random things it's not special or in any sense improbable, it's just the thing that happened to happen. By metaphysics i mean a lowest-level understanding of how we fit concepts together that is better than any other. Better in the sense of more explanatory and predictive power, more actionable, simple to understand in common language, etc.

>The foundational understanding of everything in Western philosophy. But of course in reality there is no material/spiritual (I assume by spiritual you mean mental) divide at all, the two are one and the same, so in reality they have no relationship.

They are the same only in the lowest resolution sense - that they correspond directly to one another, but when it comes time to act in the world they are very different. The fact that your favourite color exists in a specific range of wavelengths of light isn't useful in the same ways as the fact that blue is your favorite color when buying you a present.
Atla
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

Post by Atla »

Advocate wrote: Fri Mar 27, 2020 11:25 pm >Of course we can't physically 'explore' the possibilities we can't explore. We can merely come up with guesses, and debate which guess is the simplest / most likely. But it can't be proven or disproven. (That's why metaphysics can't be fully solved.)

The answer to metaphysics is the same as the answer to physics or any complex phenomenon, a metaphor or set of maxims that allows for reasonable certainty and actionability, not something absolute, but even in a relative sense it can be absolutely better than any known alternative, so The Answer, is here: tiny.cc/TheThingIs. If there's a more comprehensive, more understandable, more logically necessary, more useful (etc.) version than that, it's the answer instead, but there isn't. Metaphysics is solved in that all possible metaphysical questions can be answered with that understanding. What "answered" means is a different question but also relatively simple.

>But the idea that we are cosmic accidents is almost infinitely unlikely, and can be dismissed. So looks like, by metaphysics you just mean the core of metaphysics that can be posited beyond reasonable doubt.

It's only unlikely if you first choose a specific desired outcome. As one of infinite random things it's not special or in any sense improbable, it's just the thing that happened to happen. By metaphysics i mean a lowest-level understanding of how we fit concepts together that is better than any other. Better in the sense of more explanatory and predictive power, more actionable, simple to understand in common language, etc.

>The foundational understanding of everything in Western philosophy. But of course in reality there is no material/spiritual (I assume by spiritual you mean mental) divide at all, the two are one and the same, so in reality they have no relationship.

They are the same only in the lowest resolution sense - that they correspond directly to one another, but when it comes time to act in the world they are very different. The fact that your favourite color exists in a specific range of wavelengths of light isn't useful in the same ways as the fact that blue is your favorite color when buying you a present.
So I think we can agree then that you are simply misusing the word 'metaphysics', you are just talking about the core part of it, that can be posited beyond reasonable doubt. As I've shown, that doesn't give a satisfying answer (satisfying guess) to several big questions.
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

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>So I think we can agree then that you are simply misusing the word 'metaphysics', you are just talking about the core part of it, that can be posited beyond reasonable doubt. As I've shown, that doesn't give a satisfying answer (satisfying guess) to several big questions.

I can answer every metaphysical and epistemological question from that same toolbox. I await eagerly await that trial. The truth does not wish to be believed, it wishes to be tested. All my answers in the realm of Truth Wisdom are beyond a reasonable doubt.
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

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All my answers can be "proven" beyond a reasonable doubt, including what that means and why each point is necessarily true, all the way to the bottom.
Atla
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

Post by Atla »

Advocate wrote: Wed Apr 08, 2020 6:58 pm All my answers can be "proven" beyond a reasonable doubt, including what that means and why each point is necessarily true, all the way to the bottom.
Please look up already what the word metaphysics means. Only a core part of it can be proven beyond reasonable doubt, the rest is at best educated guesswork. By definition metaphysics can't be "solved".
Figuring out that core part is vital, that's the basis, but insufficient in itself. Well at least I can't understand the mentality of not trying to come up with an explanation for our existence.
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

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>Please look up already what the word metaphysics means. Only a core part of it can be proven beyond reasonable doubt, the rest is at best educated guesswork. By definition metaphysics can't be "solved".
Figuring out that core part is vital, that's the basis, but insufficient in itself. Well at least I can't understand the mentality of not trying to come up with an explanation for our existence.

I can answer ALL metaphysical questions, not just some core part of them. If it's "beyond physics" about what "is", ontologically, epistemologically, metaphysically, it can be answered. The only way it's not possible is if you put "solved" in a transcendent category but i can show you perfectly why that's wrong too.
Atla
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

Post by Atla »

Advocate wrote: Wed Apr 08, 2020 9:43 pm I can answer ALL metaphysical questions, not just some core part of them. If it's "beyond physics" about what "is", ontologically, epistemologically, metaphysically, it can be answered. The only way it's not possible is if you put "solved" in a transcendent category but i can show you perfectly why that's wrong too.
That's what 'solved metaphysics' means. For example tell me how you figured out with certainty whether or not a god created our universe.
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

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>For example tell me how you figured out with certainty whether or not a god created our universe.

That's a great example because both certainty and god are transcendent concepts and transcendence is one of the core understandings that "solves" many metaphysical questions.

The distinction between Actuality and Reality is at issue. Transcendence is the line between them. As i use the words, Actuality is the universe beyond us. Reality is our consensus experience of it. Words like infinity, certainty, god, perfection, all reference that which cannot be measured and for which there is not enough information to determine logical necessity. As such, the word transcendence itself, like all those others, can only be a stand-in for "that which is beyond us". Infinity means 'keep going". Perfection is a direction, not a destination.

Certainty means "as justified a belief as is possible". There can be no such thing as "absolute certainty" in the sense of a belief that encompasses that which is beyond verification. Likewise, god definitely exists as a concept but cannot be said to exist in either Reality or Actuality, as it neither admits of definition sufficient to be tested or actual testing.

Therefore, since god is an untestable concept, like all untestable concepts it is indistinguishable from fiction. (Logical necessity would also be a test, but i can defeat any argument for any definition of god being logically necessary as well.) A concept indistinguishable from fiction cannot be said to be a cause of anything. Moreover, even if the universe required a cause (which i'll get to in the next paragraph), even an existing god would not solve the problem because there's no reason that god wouldn't itself need a cause, but that's an old argument that's been done to death.

However, there's no reason to believe the universe began, or that beginnings are an Actual thing. There are no beginnings in Actuality because there are no patterns there. Patterns exist to us because we differentiate in order to recognise and accomplish change in the world. The end of a person isn't death to the universe, it's death to us. To the universe it's a change of state from matter that behaves in one way to the same matter behaving in a different way, not a difference that matters. To us, we say something begins or ends when our experience of that undifferentiated stuff changes. For example, when we bite into an apple, we change the shape of it, but all the stuff still exists. When we "finish" the apple, we discard it because it has reached the "end" of it's usefulness, but all the apple-stuff still exists, simply in a different form, scattered in physical space. The boundary between the apple and the rest of the universe was never a set line in space, but a set intention by which we distinguished it from everything else.

If any of that is unclear i can expand upon it, but the core concepts are there. I am "certain" that "god" did not create ("begin") the universe because a) i have the greatest possible justifiable belief that there is no definition of god which can render it necessarily or even potentially Real. b) there is no reason to believe the universe ever "began" (even if you accept the big bang theory), or that anything ever begins, or ends, except in relation to our purposes for it. c) even if there is a god and the universe did "begin" by some definition, there's no testable or logically necessary reason god did it.
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

Post by AlexW »

Advocate wrote: Sun Apr 12, 2020 2:56 pm The distinction between Actuality and Reality is at issue. Transcendence is the line between them. As i use the words, Actuality is the universe beyond us. Reality is our consensus experience of it.
There are many great points in your explanations, but, to me, all of this is pretty simple:
Reality is neither true nor is it false.
Thus: whatever can be said to be either true or false is not real, it is an interpretation/concept/idea/belief.

When you open your eyes and look at whatever is around you - and I am not talking about the interpretation of what you believe you are seeing - then this visual field is neither true nor is it false - it simply "is" (and even saying that it "is" is already an interpretation that I only use because language works that way).
When you bite into and taste and apple then - again - this taste is neither true nor is it false - it simply is.

The "taste of apple" is reality - but all thoughts about the percept are conceptual interpretations - they can be measured, discussed, doubted, agreed upon, feared, hated, loved... they are conceptualised "things" that thought can grasp and play with. They are a thought-made, dualistic wrapper of "something" (of reality) that is actually "there beyond/before" conceptual thought has labelled patterns, hijacked them and dropped them into a world of things.

This is really all that has to be known about metaphysics: Whatever is thought of, whatever can be said is not actually real, it is an interpretation - it creates the world of concepts - which is populated by separate things - which we believe is the world/universe we live in... but reality is not to be found within this world of things.
It is before this world came to be, before all interpretations.
It is the "taste of an apple" - but: it is neither an apple nor not an apple (which means: concepts simply don't apply - yes they seem to be "getting close" - but ask yourself: to what? to the "taste of an apple"?).
Atla
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

Post by Atla »

Advocate wrote: Sun Apr 12, 2020 2:56 pm >For example tell me how you figured out with certainty whether or not a god created our universe.

That's a great example because both certainty and god are transcendent concepts and transcendence is one of the core understandings that "solves" many metaphysical questions.

The distinction between Actuality and Reality is at issue. Transcendence is the line between them. As i use the words, Actuality is the universe beyond us. Reality is our consensus experience of it. Words like infinity, certainty, god, perfection, all reference that which cannot be measured and for which there is not enough information to determine logical necessity. As such, the word transcendence itself, like all those others, can only be a stand-in for "that which is beyond us". Infinity means 'keep going". Perfection is a direction, not a destination.

Certainty means "as justified a belief as is possible". There can be no such thing as "absolute certainty" in the sense of a belief that encompasses that which is beyond verification. Likewise, god definitely exists as a concept but cannot be said to exist in either Reality or Actuality, as it neither admits of definition sufficient to be tested or actual testing.

Therefore, since god is an untestable concept, like all untestable concepts it is indistinguishable from fiction. (Logical necessity would also be a test, but i can defeat any argument for any definition of god being logically necessary as well.) A concept indistinguishable from fiction cannot be said to be a cause of anything. Moreover, even if the universe required a cause (which i'll get to in the next paragraph), even an existing god would not solve the problem because there's no reason that god wouldn't itself need a cause, but that's an old argument that's been done to death.

However, there's no reason to believe the universe began, or that beginnings are an Actual thing. There are no beginnings in Actuality because there are no patterns there. Patterns exist to us because we differentiate in order to recognise and accomplish change in the world. The end of a person isn't death to the universe, it's death to us. To the universe it's a change of state from matter that behaves in one way to the same matter behaving in a different way, not a difference that matters. To us, we say something begins or ends when our experience of that undifferentiated stuff changes. For example, when we bite into an apple, we change the shape of it, but all the stuff still exists. When we "finish" the apple, we discard it because it has reached the "end" of it's usefulness, but all the apple-stuff still exists, simply in a different form, scattered in physical space. The boundary between the apple and the rest of the universe was never a set line in space, but a set intention by which we distinguished it from everything else.

If any of that is unclear i can expand upon it, but the core concepts are there. I am "certain" that "god" did not create ("begin") the universe because a) i have the greatest possible justifiable belief that there is no definition of god which can render it necessarily or even potentially Real. b) there is no reason to believe the universe ever "began" (even if you accept the big bang theory), or that anything ever begins, or ends, except in relation to our purposes for it. c) even if there is a god and the universe did "begin" by some definition, there's no testable or logically necessary reason god did it.
That's what I called the core part of metaphysics that can be posited beyond reasonable doubt, with "certainty" as you define it.

"Solving metaphysics" would include absolute certainty as well, about things that are beyond our verification. But I guess one can redefine metaphysics to only mean its core part.

Figuring out this core part, which you call metaphysics isn't all that rare, I achieved that too. That's just the first step, for me, that's where philosophy really starts. Mainly because in itself, it doesn't give a satisfying guess about why we humans are here, after all.

The 'cosmic accident' explanation is probably popular nonsense, no offense. Why would this extremely unlikely universe be the only one. If there's an infinity of them, then is there something 'special' about this one?

(Also, it isn't clear to me, did you have your 'nondual awakening'? As part of solving what you call metaphysics.)
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Re: Some Metaphysical Questions (answered)

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AlexW wrote: Sun Apr 12, 2020 11:22 pm Reality is neither true nor is it false.
Metaphysics only exists in the human bubble, so words like "true" and "reality" must likewise only exist within that bubble. Words are only as meaningful as they are useful and to be useful they must be in range of something we can verify. This can mean empirical measurement or logical necessity but it cannot mean anything transcendent. Things are as "real" as they are replicable. The more you can test something, the more real it is "for all intents and purposes". Positing transcendence as a marker for truth isn't useful because we simply don't have that information yet. In the future what is considered true now may no longer be, but until it isn't based on the best evidence we've got, we have no chance but to accept it as such until that time.
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