[MD] The Edge 2006 Annual Question

[Scott Roberts]

Ham,


 Scott said:
> You're deforming what I am saying to fit into your
> categories again. If existence and essence are a CI,
> one can't really say that existence can be taken "at
> face value". For most people, "face value" is the
> "just there" notion, which I am trying to subvert.

Ham,
Most people do take existence at face value.  This is what I'm trying to
subvert, also.  But I'm not sure that you can effectively subvert this
notion without positing a transcendant source.

Scott:
And I'm saying that one doesn't need a source to subvert it, that the LCI 
does the trick without recourse to a source.

Scott said:
> Also, I wouldn't say that existence is differentiated
> by time and space, rather I would say that it is the
> differentiation. The whole is more than existence,
> however. It is also essence, in contradictory identity
> with existence. Pantheism equates God and Nature.
> I do not. Nature as we perceive it is an expression of
> the divine (the non-spatiotemporal, whatever), not
> equal to it. As to purpose and meaning, I've said they
> are ubiquitous, so I don't understand why you think
> they are missing.

Ham said:
Existence is the differentation of Essence by time and space.  The problem
we're having is that you cannot accept existence as the differentiated
modality of a transcendent source.  You stop at existence, while at the same
time claiming that "the whole is more than existence".  What is the "more"?

Scott:
Essence, as I say in the very next sentence. On not accepting modality, see 
below.

Ham continued:
You say it is also essence in contradiction with existence.  Does that not
define two identities?

Scott:
No it does not. That is the whole point of the LCI, that one cannot say that 
they are two identities, nor can one say that one is real and the other an 
illusion, nor can one say that both are an illusion. You have quoted Clyde 
Miller on Cusa as follows:

"For any given non-divine X, X is not other than X, and X is other than not 
X.  For the divine not other, X is not other than either X or not X."

The LCI says that for all those metaphysical dilemmas (essence vs. 
existence, one vs. many, continuity vs. change, the nature of the self, the 
nature of consciousness, etc.), the logic of the divine not other applies. 
(However, the LCI also does not accept this particular statement of the 
logic of the divine either, instead it is based on the Buddhist tetralemma: 
not X, not not-X, not both X and not-X, and not neither X nor not-X).


 Ham continued:
Is one higher than the other?

Scott:
Since each depends totally on the other, neither is higher than the other.

Ham saidt:
For me, existence and
Oneness are two modes of Essence -- the "actualized" and the "potential", if
you will, or "appearance" and "source".  That's one reality without
contradiction apart from its differentiated appearance.

Scott:
Modalism, applied to the Trinity, is a Christian heresy. It is a way to try 
to make the inherently mysterious understandable, but in doing so it 
distorts. The LCI says: to the extent that you force an understanding on a 
mystery such as the relation between the one and the many (e.g., through 
modalism, or dualism), you are similarly heading in the wrong direction.

Ham said:
Also, saying that purpose and meaning are "ubiquitous" does nothing to
define these terms or to explain their value to the individual.  (Possibly
you have dealt with value in other posts, but your position is a blank slate
to me.)

Scott:
I agree. Value, and just about every other big-time metaphysical word (e.g., 
'truth', 'reality', 'good', 'reason', 'will') is undefinable and 
unexplainable. Learned ignorance applies.

Ham said:
Aquinas may have alluded to God's "intellect", as do many theists.  But,
since Aquinas' essence was "being" and "form" -- to him even Nature was an
essence -- it has little in common with what I propose as Essence.

Scott:
I've asked before, but don't recall an answer: if what you propose as 
Essence has little in common with essence, why did you choose that word for 
your Source? Why use any word other than Source?

- Scott