[MD] Fundamental Reality and Creation

[MarshaV]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Ham Priday" <hampday1 at verizon.net>
To: <moq_discuss at moqtalk.org>
Sent: Wednesday, July 16, 2008 7:08 PM
Subject: Re: [MD] Fundamental Reality and Creation


> To those whose metaphysical quest has been preempted by the pursuit of 
> "the intellect" -- 
>
> Now that we have the intellect squared away, or at least in the throes of 
> being defined, I would like to take up the most fundamental of all 
> questions -- What is Reality and how does it create?

Hi Ham,

Which reality would that be, the inorganic reality, the biological reality, 
the social reality, the intellectual reality or the code of art reality? 
The "absolute reality is a solid block of concrete" analogy sounds absurd. 
According to the MOQ reality is value/process/experience.

Marsha




>
> Inasmuch as the world, the individual, experience, and intellectual 
> thought all participate in Reality, it seems to me that this is logically 
> the first question a philosopher should be obliged to answer. There's a 
> method to my madness, of course, and your answers can help resolve a 
> logical problem in my metaphysics that I've been struggling with for 
> years.  It concerns the 'ex nihilo' principle, which has been disputed by 
> some here (for the wrong reasons, I believe), but I may have an 
> explanation that will satisfy them.
>
> As a universal principle, I think most of us would agree that we can't get
> something from nothing.  Getting something from nothing refutes the laws 
> of logic, thermodynamics, relativity, and cause-and-effect.  Even an 
> evolutionist understanding of creation places the beginning as the "first 
> cause", whether it's a big bang or an unbalanced mass of energy.  Few, if 
> any, physicists accept the idea that an absolute void can give rise to 
> anything, let alone an  infinite universe.  Yet, the universe was created 
> and does exist, and I've been criticized for stating that nothingness is 
> the ground of its existence.  Okay, so far?
>
> Well, I'm about to propose that there is a singular variance to this rule 
> and   I'll explain it using analogies, so please withhold your logical 
> arguments until you have a grasp of the concept.  My idea has to do with 
> the reduction of an absolute.
>
> Pretend for a moment that absolute reality is a solid block of concrete, a 
> block so large that it has no boundaries.  Now, suppose a fracture occurs 
> in this concrete monolith, effectively dividing it in two.  Since the 
> block occupies all of space, the "crack" would necessarily be 
> infinitesimal, like the imaginary line that serves to describe geometric 
> figures.  Nonetheless, for all practical purposes, the block has undergone 
> a difference: it is no longer a unity but has spawned an "other" by virtue 
> of that infinitesimal fissure.
>
> In my website thesis I use the analogy of the mountain climber who has 
> ascended to the highest summit and for whom further progress can only be 
> descent.  Both analogies demonstrate that an absolute source is the 
> singular entity for which creation, difference, or the appearance of 
> otherness is exclusionary rather than additive.  Note that they do not 
> refute the 'ex nihilo' principle.  They do not assume nothing as the 
> primary source.  What they suggest is that for an absolute source the 
> creation of difference is "reductive" in nature.  Only an absolute entity 
> creates by "exclusion", which is to say that existence is not something 
> "added" to nothingness but, rather, the potential of nothingness to create 
> the appearance of divided otherness.
>
> Whether you call the primary source God, Supreme Being, Dynamic Quality, 
> the Intellectual Level, Sensibility, Consciousness, Atman, or Life-force, 
> if you believe that this source is absolute, I submit that the ontogeny of 
> creation must follow the principle of negation (i.e., exclusion or 
> reduction) as outlined above.
>
> I doubt that you'll find any clarifying statements from Pirsig on this 
> topic, but would like to see how you respond and to what extent you agree 
> with this proposition.
>
> Thanks, folks.
> Ham
>
> Moq_Discuss mailing list
> Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc.
> http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org
> Archives:
> http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/
> http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/