[MD] a-theism and atheism

[rapsncows at fastmail.fm]

Mark,


> [Mark]
> Tim, you preface this with "casual reader".  I would change that phrase
> to
> "indoctrinated reader".  Our education is based on object recognition. 
> So
> this is nothing casual, it is well trained.  What I am suggesting, is to
> replace the object with what is defining it, that is Quality.  Quality
> can
> only be seen as a difference between things.  If there is only one thing,
> we
> would have not idea as to its quality.  The concept of separation does
> not
> quite do the trick, but it helps to get there.

[Tim]
yes, I am encouraging this relational understanding.  But I am just
trying to make certain that we don't loose ourselves in the process!


>[Mark] Your recognition of objects is just as much a matter of faith as seeing
> it the other way around.

[Tim]
let me just state simply: when I say 'object' I am not thinking of some
object devoid of Quality.


> [Mark]  This faith is so deep, that one does not even
> question it.  My interpretation of Quality questions that faith in
> objects as essents (that was for Ham).

[Tim]
I have no clue what an essent is.  Sorry Ham.  I haven't yet been able
to link anything that Ham has said to anything that I can know.  I
thought I was there, but it evaporated.  Perhaps we are experiencing
something akin to that with 'object'.  Further, this faith may be even
deeper than you give it credit for here.  When you say, "MY" -
interpretation of quality, this is what I am pointing to by faith.  It
is something that cannot leave you.  that is how you are held together. 
That is what makes you capable of claiming that you are still you from
email to email, from now to now.  If you didn't faithe yourself... 
Quality does not get behind that veil; RMP started, "you know quality".

> [Mark]  It is not a matter of being further in, it
> is just a different perspective.  Have you ever seen those optical
> pictures that can be seen two ways, but never both ways as the same time.  The one
> I am thinking of is a picture of a silhouette of two people's faces facing
> each other in black, but between them contoured by their faces is a vase.
>  So either it is a picture of a vase or a picture of two faces, but not
> both.  (I can find it on the internet if you want).  The brain does funny
> things with object recognition.  Quality is a paradigm shift, for lack of
> a better word.  It is telling the brain to change its perspective.

[Tim]
first, recognize, you haven't had a problem with subject recognition.  I
understand that to limit oneself to an understanding of oneself based on
ones relation to objects which come by indoctrination, is... well,
limiting.  Certain limits are more restrictive than others.  But, there
is an ultimate limit.  There is a reality.  There is a boundary even in
your Quality.

btw, I know the picture you are thinking of.



> 
> [Mark]
> The analogy is meant to show that a model is to data as Quality is to
> objects.  Since Quality is only one word, we can say that it is a
> simplification of many objects.  This is just an analogy and cannot be
> taken literally, of course.

[Tim]
this is what I didn't like.  A model is to data as your model of reality
is to your objects.  But we only have models for things we think are
real, in reality; they are links to doing something real (destroying a
wall with a cannon ball).



> 
> [Mark]
> Well yes, I would agree with you there, I cannot live in a world that is
> purely metaphysical thought.  To eat a sandwich, it is the bread and ham
> and
> cheese that matters.  Metaphysics is a model.  However, just like with
> the
> model of gravity, it can help to understand and to generalize things.
>  Quality can make sense out of things that seem weird or threatening.

[Tim]
and quality, as I understand it, is to help make sense out of the fact
that subjects (humans) are stranger than they might appear at first
blush.  But it is not to do away with me altogether, "you know quality".


> 
> [Mark]
> I'm not quite sure what you mean here.  Data must support the model, yes.
>  Let's call reality Quality (for example).  The presence of realized
>  objects
> could be said to support Quality.  Just like data and a model.  Of course
> the model of Quality is more intuitive, and I am not sure what equation
> we
> can give it, so we just have to use it as if it was a valid model.  Doing
> this creates an awareness that can fit the model.  Maybe that was kind of
> circular, but I am doing my best here.

[Tim]
It seems you are stuck in a model world!  My falling to the Earth is a
real phenomena.  If I want to live amongst this reality, I have to
devise a way to handle it.  I model it, knowing that the model can never
be fully up-to-date.  To teh extent that I can harmonize my model with
the underlying reality, I can maximize my potential for choice.  [so,
just like your analogy of gravity was to help open up ideas about the
deeper nature of you, in relation - quality - I would suggest that this
idea of harmonizing might open up the deeper nature of modeling - but
you have to faithe that there is something to which your model might
harmonize.  Otherwise you are modeling to model, and I'd then rather
watch that Victoria's secret girl.]



> [Mark]
> What I meant was that gravity is the model.  It is the theory of gravity,
> something that we made up.  Gravity is a creation of the mind, it has all
> sorts of equations associated with it that people thought up (well, at
> least Newton and Einstein).  The falling object is not gravity (the model).
> Objects are not Quality.

[Tim]
I had been using 'gravity' as the underlying phenomena.  In order for
one I to be able to have a meaningful relation with another I, there
must be a real phenomena of relation.


> [Mark]
> Perhaps, I'll have to think about that.  What I would say, is that static
> patterns are the objects, Quality is the model.  With this analogy
> dynamic
> quality would perhaps be the rate at which the objects fall.  So, the
> objects and the rate they fall is equal to Quality (Gravity).  This is of
> course an oversimplification, and stretches the analogy.  But, nothing is
> perfect and this is simply done at the expense of destroying the analogy.
>  So don't take that too seriously.

[Tim]
I have never thought of using 'quality' as a name for my model.  my
model is to get at quality.  I am trying to harmonize the two.  I know
that is strictly impossible; faithe seems to make up that integral
difference.  Perhaps I can call this the miracle of life.  (It's gotta
work though, because 'nothing' is impossible.)


> [Mark]
> The analogy I was pointing at with words, is that words are simply data
> points in the model of the concept I am trying to convey.  Of course, as
> you
> say, words are tricky things because they are not static, but very
> subjective.  My creation of a concept with words would take your
> accepting
> them in exactly the same way I am using them, which is highly improbable.

[Tim]
however improbable, it works pretty well.
 

> [Mark]
> Well, what I do with it is a long story.  In many ways, I had to do it. 
> I asked too many questions and lost meaning.
> 

[Tim]
this sounds interesting.  how long ago?  have you found meaning again
yet?

Tim
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