jupiviv wrote:The sensations are abstract to the extent they are mental events like thoughts, but they are caused and indeed made up of physical things.
They are caused. Period. Like all other appearances, like everything else. That's a given.
Abstraction and physicality are qualities of finite things, hence interdependent.
Finite things could be just as easily called "qualities of abstraction" or artefacts of any
notion of physicality. Interdependence -- sure but the idea of one thing being a quality of another introduces already way too many intricate issues. But most of all it would imply again some "inherent existence", that of your imaginary finite thing.
"Exist as something" is another way of saying an object would be existing "in itself" or inherently.
That's a bit disingenuous unless you believe that existence is the only quality attributable to objects.
All objects are nothing but impossible beliefs, fabrications, ultimately inconstant and stressful. Like attempts to draw a circle around nothing using nothing concrete. Only through this deception the magical circus starts. Underneath it you'll find a will, a desire operating, to will things into some "existence", to have imagination become "real". With this magical act, we, collectively have created worlds to inhabit as beings. When saying this is illusion, it's not meant to negate any
function or
causality to it. The reason to talk about illusion only takes place in a discussion about finding truth or meaning - any
solidness indeed.
if a thing is the same as its appearance because "it can only appear to you", then that itself is something you *claim* *appears*. The mere fact that a thing is what it appears to be does not substantiate it in the least, so at *best* it is a positive claim that needs to be explained further and/or demonstrated.
The positive, fancy claim here is the idea that there's a
thing somewhere operating independent of its appearance, in some way existing in or of itself, as entity or object. This goes way beyond admitting there "are causes" attached to a thing. It's about realizing we can only speak about things as a certain practical, contextual modelling of experiences or calculations. Beyond that framework, which will change with every use or slightly different orientation, it doesn't have any
existence.
There's no confusion the moment it's seen that they are the same thing as far as determination of any thingness or its actual existence goes. Any other view is based on imaginary worlds, which might work well for you but imaginary worlds can be highly functional, like models, until they increasingly start to mislead.
You're positing an unnecessary *third* entity here - the appearance of the thing that is the same as its appearance. Try all you want but you won't get around this error.
You're not counting right. If they're the same thing, there's no third entity introduced but one
removed: its "double", the one you try to introduce as some kind of reality or faith in a physical thing trying to "get through" our senses. It's a by-product of your natural desire to exist, become real, to project a creative drive on the world, even to philosophize about it. But I know where it will end.