[MD] The Dynamics of Value

[118]

Hi Ham,

On Wed, Jan 12, 2011 at 9:14 AM, Ham Priday <hampday1 at verizon.net> wrote:
[Ham]
>
> 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.

[Mark]
Yes, a dream within a dream.  It would seem that we are switching
words for rhetorical effect, which I do not have a problem with by the
way.  So, reality is now illusion.  I like the term appearance,
however, I am not quite sure why.  I am also a fan of the holographic
universe.  But, that something is more real than this, I don't know.
I use the word illusion when people seem so sure about what they are
saying.
>
> 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?

[Mark]
Well Buddha talked about it.  It is the result of reductive analysis
without any desire to find a unifying creator.  It is also pretty easy
to analyze reality in that way.
>
> 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.

[Mark]
What I interpret from this is that realizing other makes us whole
again, and thus we are always trying to approach the Absolute Source.
I kind of like this (at least my interpretation of your paragraph).  I
suppose you could also say that the self is other less that which is
the self.  So, value makes us intuit the Absolute source.  I would
also call this Quality.  I think I am having a wiring problem in my
brain now, so I'll have to slow down and meditate on this.  Too many
images streaming past now.
>
> 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]
> 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.

[Mark]
I figured you would say that, but I meant it as a compliment.  I
suppose to be a Buddhist one has to believe in reincarnation and
Karma; you haven't spoken of those things.  Still there are some
similarities that I see.  Of course I am reading these posts and
interpreting them, so it stands to reason that my interpretation is
somewhat single minded.  However,  I still say that it is not
necessary to create things that we can never Know.  We Know all of it,
just not symbolically.  The symbolic is just for communication,
nothing more.  It is a feature of the societal level, that we confuse
with a personal level.  Our thoughts are just a small part of the
experience.
>
> Thanks for both of your analyses.  From where I sit, they've made the
> ontology of Essence far more comprehensible.

[Mark]
Thanks to you Ham!  You have perhaps unwittingly set me off on another
mind adventure.  Hope I come back and don't need treatment to righten
my brain.  (and no, I am not being derogatory, only sympathetic).

Cheers,
Mark
>

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