So I have been working on some thoughts. I have been looking at how life is structured, all the problems, all the insanity. Here is a sort of rough draft of the general idea:

1) All concepts are lies. That means morals, distinctions, beliefs etc.

2) There is no reason to exist. The only reason is that we exist.

3) Only that which exists is of any matter.

4) There is only this moment.

I know this doesn't sound spiritual, but there is more to it. But is not my job to state what that is. I have my truth, that I have come to on my own. If you wish to look, I can point a way:

Make a list of things that exist and don't exist. No need to post it here.

Posted by dirt So I have been working on some thoughts. I have been looking at how life is structured, all the problems, all the insanity. Here is a sort of rough draft of the general idea: 1) All concepts are lies. That means morals, distinctions, beliefs etc. 2) There is no reason to exist. The only reason is that we exist. 3) Only that which exists is of any matter. 4) There is only this moment. I know this doesn't sound spiritual, but there is more to it. But is not my job to state what that is. I have my truth, that I have come to on my own. If you wish to look, I can point a way: Make a list of things that exist and don't exist. No need to post it here.

So basically, to answer #1, all concepts are rhetorical? I mean I can have morals but they are never absolute and are based upon the general guidelines my community lays forth for me to follow. If we decide that not smelling like crap is a "good" then cleanliness becomes a moral or more as it would be. So, yeah I'm with you there and you would probably not find many who aren't.

#2-3 was taken on by another rhetorician, Gorgias, in a fragment called "On Nature or the Non-Existent," I could never "get it" but here's the gist:

1. Nothing exists;
2. Even if something exists, nothing can be known about it; and
3. Even if something can be known about it, knowledge about it can't be communicated to others.

#4 need further explication. Do you mean in secular sense like "the future and the past don't exist"? Or in an anti-ever after sense like "why work for salvation when there is only now"?

I'm not knocking your beliefs, I just want to work with them and see where we can go.

I disagree with you on all but your 3rd point.


Note that the context of "we" used in this writing identifies all consciousness in the universe.

Anyway, I disagree because:

Everything in the universe only exists because we can perceive it, no? If we didn't exist to perceive the universe as it is, there would be nothing, because there would never any perception of a universe in the first place.

If you can agree with me on that then you'll realize that it's impossible for a concept to be a "lie" assuming you mean "lie" to mean impossible, unreal, or nonexistent. They are real because we can perceive them, they are tangible. You can't touch a concept, but you can understand it because it exists, and only because it exists.

This is the same for everything else in the universe. Everything. It all exists, but only because we allow it to by our perception of it.

Therein also lies the problem with #2. We cannot simply exist to exist, for simply in existing, we also create the universe by perceiving everything in it. By that perception, it would seem that we; the collective consciousness, exist TO create the universe, for without that consciousness there would be no universe at all.

In this train of thought, then obviously your 3rd point is correct for the same reasons. If something doesn't exist, then it never mattered in the first place, because it never was.


Anything that cannot be perceived cannot be real. Since we can understand that there is a past and future, they are also real. Like the universe, time itself only exists because we allow it to.


There IS only this moment in what you make of it however, and I strongly agree in that.

Posted by G to the Race So basically, to answer #1, all concepts are rhetorical? I mean I can have morals but they are never absolute and are based upon the general guidelines my community lays forth for me to follow. If we decide that not smelling like crap is a "good" then cleanliness becomes a moral or more as it would be. So, yeah I'm with you there and you would probably not find many who aren't.

Sort of. The problem with Community driven ethics and morals is that 1) most people did not give direct consent 2) That creating rules for other people is defying the moment, fighting with reality, and focusing more on others then on self. And one cannot know others, just self.

#2-3 was taken on by another rhetorician, Gorgias, in a fragment called "On Nature or the Non-Existent," I could never "get it" but here's the gist:

I got my idea from Jean Paul Sartre.

1. Nothing exists;

No, things do exist, I exist, inherently.

2. Even if something exists, nothing can be known about it; and

Also I disagree. I know that I can see and perceive surroundings.

3. Even if something can be known about it, knowledge about it can't be communicated to others.

Half rights. Truth cannot be communicated. Communication is a duplication, a fake, a lie. But one can point.

[quote#4 need further explication. Do you mean in secular sense like "the future and the past don't exist"? Or in an anti-ever after sense like "why work for salvation when there is only now"?[/quote]

Time does not exist. If one is always present in the moment, then nothing can be wrong unless life and limb are threatened.

I'm not knocking your beliefs, I just want to work with them and see where we can go.

No problem, if I wasn't open to scrutiny, then I would not have posted.

Posted by ActionSatisfaction Esq. Everything in the universe only exists because we can perceive it, no? If we didn't exist to perceive the universe as it is, there would be nothing, because there would never any perception of a universe in the first place.

You are getting ahead of yourself. Slow down, You touched on a bit of truth, but truth has a razors edge. You could lose all this to conceptualization. You have touched upon the true meaning of "god". But you are only half way there. There are things that exist without "perception". I know I sound full of it, but that has to do with the inability to communicate the truth.

If you can agree with me on that then you'll realize that it's impossible for a concept to be a "lie" assuming you mean "lie" to mean impossible, unreal, or nonexistent. They are real because we can perceive them, they are tangible. You can't touch a concept, but you can understand it because it exists, and only because it exists.

There is a major distinction between thoughts and concepts. A thought exists as a vibration, but a concept is empty. To understand something doesn't mean it exists. That just means you are rationalizing a concept with a concept. No dice.

This is the same for everything else in the universe. Everything. It all exists, but only because we allow it to by our perception of it.

Wrong. Law of conservation of energy. It exists, and will always exist, whether or not we are around to see it. Although it is true that we affect an object by observing it(Al a quantum physics).

Therein also lies the problem with #2. We cannot simply exist to exist, for simply in existing, we also create the universe by perceiving everything in it. By that perception, it would seem that we; the collective consciousness, exist TO create the universe, for without that consciousness there would be no universe at all.

We are the universe, perceiving has nothing to do with it.

In this train of thought, then obviously your 3rd point is correct for the same reasons. If something doesn't exist, then it never mattered in the first place, because it never was.

Concept land.

Anything that cannot be perceived cannot be real. Since we can understand that there is a past and future, they are also real. Like the universe, time itself only exists because we allow it to.

Oh? Is that so? Our mind makes a copy, or more correctly a generalization of a "past", a concept that is not based in the present. Just like how you can from thoughts to point an idea(which is empty), the mind creates a past. A gaping wound in the past is not a wound in the present. It is a scar in the present.

There IS only this moment in what you make of it however, and I strongly agree in that.

See, your thinking is not lining up. If time was segregated into three categories, how could they exist simultaneously? And more than that, by your logic if we create all that we perceive, then we would have to create them all simultaneously. That means being at multiple places at once. If that is the case, how would you be the same person. Choices one makes could go many different routes. It would make more sense is all time existed a a single point.

Posted by ActionSatisfaction Esq. Anything that cannot be perceived cannot be real. Since we can understand that there is a past and future, they are also real. Like the universe, time itself only exists because we allow it to.

If that's true, then we have a painfully boring existence. Imagine you are a toddler. You have no concept of anything beyond your little world of eating, sleeping, pooping, and such. You have no way of perceiving the outside world, so does that mean it doesn't exist?

Posted by ActionSatisfaction Esq. Everything in the universe only exists because we can perceive it, no?

No. Perception does not prove existence.

Perception of things doesn't even prove the existence of the perceiver.

Hmmm, how troublesome!

Posted by ActionSatisfaction Esq. Hmmm, how troublesome!

It troublesome because you made things more complicated than they really are. Simplify. Start form zero, then work your way up.

Posted by MutantMandias No. Perception does not prove existence. Perception of things doesn't even prove the existence of the perceiver.

I perceive a mirage. Does that make it real?

Posted by snap228 I perceive a mirage. Does that make it real?

Two things:

1) What are you arguing?

2) Yes, the "mirage" is real in the sense that heat and heat waves exist as moving particles. So either you are getting at something I don't quite understand, or you made a point that just failed.

Well my main idea was that without any consciousness to realize there is anything there, there might as well not be anything there at all. I don't see how that can be any other way.

In Oryx's example she asks whether the world outside what a baby can understand exists. And the answer for that baby is still no. Nothing outside what that baby can observe exists for the baby itself. Nothing else is real to that baby. What I'm saying is that, but on a grand scale. The baby is a bad example because my idea was never meant for an individual, but all universal consciousness as a whole.

If a tree falls in a forest and nobody sees it, then until somebody can observe in some way that the tree has fallen, who's to say it fell at all? As soon as a consciousness can observe the fallen tree though, the realization that the tree has fallen becomes real in the universe, immediately, and faster then the speed of light. If I'm still getting this wrong, blame Schrödinger!

I just picked up a book on quantum theory, read the first chapter, thought a bit, and realized I'm indeed contradicting myself from one part of my first post to the other. And then I realized that my 2nd post once again contradicts the first half of my post.

Anyway, contradictions aside (just means I'm learning I suppose) I stand by my no universe without consciousness statement.

As for the rest I'll have to spend some more time thinking about (while also reading this new book).

How invigorating!

Posted by ActionSatisfaction Esq. I stand by my no universe without consciousness statement.

Of course! When all you have even known is the monkey brain, how could one see the universe differently.

The monkey builds its own house to look out of the window at the world. There is no window. There is no house. There is no monkey.

This isn't religion. It's philosophy.

LOXOR

Posted by KublaKhan This isn't religion. It's philosophy. LOXOR

If you can't see the spiritual, you are doing it wrong.

Posted by dirt Of course! When all you have even known is the monkey brain, how could one see the universe differently.

Don't assume buddy! I'll chokhmah your kether all the way to malkhut.

I'm going to make the point that a concept can exist, but only if there is an opposite concept to define it.

You destroyed the plane that anitcepts do not cease, and every same anticept undefines out.

That said, the whole world is a lie and an imagination in the eye of a great fish. Damn it, I need to imagine some more scotch.

Posted by earthworm I'm going to make the point that a concept can exist, but only if there is an opposite concept to define it. You destroyed the plane that anitcepts do not cease, and every same anticept undefines out. That said, the whole world is a lie and an imagination in the eye of a great fish. Damn it, I need to imagine some more scotch.

On what basis does that make sense? Two negatives do not make a positive. All you have is an empty container that is filled with meaning. A cup is not the scotch.