[MD] The Dynamics of Value

[Ham Priday]

Good morning, Gentlemen --


On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 12:15 PM, John Carl <ridgecoyote at gmail.com> wrote:

> [Mark, previously]:
> Yes, codependent arising, whatever that means,
> endless cycling into emptiness without beginning.
>
> [John]:
> I don't understand "cycling into emptiness without
> beginning". What I mean by codependent arising is
> two or more things which cannot exist without each
> other. In such a case, neither could be fundamental
> to the other, because they are both fundamental
> to each other.
>
> [Mark]:
> Yes, I think I understand the concept of codependent arising.
> If two things arise together, before that was there unity,
> or nothingness?  Either way, they are both unity.  So one
> thing rises into two which support each other.  This is only
> true of one is looking for beginning, or underlying nature of
> underlying nature.  So, the dynamics of the yin and yang
> can be seen for what it is, or one can ask how or why.
> Both are questions that imply a creative process.  Sure, one
> can stop at codependent arising and say that this is enough
> depth.

There IS NO nothingness, which is why there is no otherness in Reality.
The conclusion we can draw from this is that Existence is an "illusion" or 
(to borrow Hegel's word) "appearance".  Existence is a world of appearances 
where the phenomena experienced reflect the 'IS-ness' of the Absolute Source 
differentially.

I'm not sure who introduced the term "co-dependent arising", but it's an 
appropriate metaphor for the dichotomy I have postulated as Self/Other. 
Only a conscious agent (self) can realize the value of an Other, so I've 
called the realizing self 'Sensibility' and its objective referent 'the 
Value of Other'.  What, then, is this "other" that is realized by the 
conscious self?

In a "quantitative sense", it's the Absolute Source less the sensibility of 
its co-dependent agent (self).  Metaphysically, it is Essence realized 
valuistically by a negated subject whose existence is totally dependent on 
the Value of its Source (essent-value).  Thus, for simplicity sake, we can 
call this simulated or actualized other the "essent" and the value-sensible 
self  the "negate".  These are the terms I have adopted for the ontogeny of 
Essentialism.  Co-dependency is a fitting description for this dichotomous 
relationship.

The Source, however, is neither dependent nor relational, which is why 
negation is the 'causa-sui' of created existence.  What is absolute in 
essence can create an other only by negating it -- by denying its otherness, 
thereby actualizing a "synthetic reality" in which appearances represent the 
Value of Essence from the perspective of an other.   Mark has come up with 
an apt euphemism for this relational perspective: "Absolute Essence seeing 
itself":

[Mark]:
> Logically, the ultimate cause is that one creating the presence
> of interdependence.  We rationally think that for there to be
> interdependence something must have caused it.  By cycling
> into emptiness, I mean that each thing has a cause before it,
> so we go all the way back until there is nothing.  If there is
> nothing then, there is nothing now, since something does not
> come from nothing.  So we have swapped the words
> "Everything" for "Nothing", and we are left with rhetoric
> instead of truth, which is what Pirsig states.  It is how one
> creates it, not how one finds it.  Once we realize that our
> sense of intellect and communication and investigation and
> reality is like the growing hum of a bee-hive, then we are free
> to create and are not restricted by things that we feel are true.

[John]:
> Nagarjuna's idea that "even causes and conditions are empty
> of inherent existence or essence" sounds very much like a
> formulation that would irritate Ham, and delight Marsha,
> and thus it seems to me that I'm picking sides in an old
> argument when I embrace this doctrine. And yet, it does
> make sense to me for I cannot see any other way to explain
> the fact that without consciousness there can be any value,
> and without value there can be no consciousness. They are
> either the same thing, or aspects of the same thing.

[Mark]:
> I do not think this would irritate Ham since he would also
> ascribe to the interrelated nature of Absolute Essence and
> Value.  Without Value we would not know that there was
> Absolute essence, so I guess it is a moot point.  The key
> word is inherent, that is arising independently.
> My interpretation of Essentialism is that things cannot arise
> independently, they are dependent on Absolute Essence.
> So, in some ways, I think Ham is a Buddhist.  My opinion
> of course.

Ham is not a Buddhist, Mark.  But neither is he "irritated" by these 
concepts of
"independent arising" and "value without consciousness".  As you correctly 
point out, Essentialism does not rule out Value or Sensibility as coherent 
in Essence, but there is no way to describe the Oneness of Essence in 
symbolic language.  Suffice it to say that nothing we feel or experience can 
have any more truth or significance
than the ultimate source from which it is derived.  Human understanding at 
its best is imperfect and transitory because it is contaminated by our own 
nothingness.

Thanks for both of your analyses.  From where I sit, they've made the 
ontology of Essence far more comprehensible.

Essentially yours,
Ham