Well, it just shows that you can't force anyone to open their eyes if they don't want to open them .....
I'll give it one more go.
-
Hades wrote:
No, theres no reason that I 'must' believe in what anyone says.
Agreed.
And regarding their idea of infinity and totality, it is an irrational concept because it breaks the law of excluded middle, and once thats done it falls into a sea of incoherency.
And yet here we all are, dwelling within the totality of all there is.
How do you account for this?
Imagine if someone were to say to you, "Hades, justice must be either yellow or a colour other than yellow." And you might reply, "You are misguided. Justice is neither yellow, nor a colour other yellow. It is wrong to even apply these terms to them." To which the fellow exclaims, "Ah ha! You are violating the Law of Excluded Middle. Gotcha!"
Somehow, you need to find a way to expand your imagination so that you can conceptualize the third alternative which lies beyond existence and non-existence. It is there and it is very real. But you'll never be able to do this if you insist on keeping your mind confined with the conventional/empirical mindset.
That's if you're actually interested, which I have my doubts.
I don't even understand why this notion that things 'lack inherent existance' is relevant...
That is very obvious.
It can't be taken seriously. That things are contingent upon other parts is obvious, so what? That doesn't take away from the things real existance, its not lacking anything because of that.
I understand the distinction between a mirage (A reflection of something that isn't there) and a reality.
But if you think reality is a mirage, that everything lacks inherent existance, and is simply a reflection of something that isn't there, then you will be stuck in an infinite regress, you will never be able to account for what is real vs what is illusion.
It's actually very easy, once you develop some philosophical expertise.
Be honest, mate, you're just a beginner in these matters and yet here you are, pontificating as though you were an expert. You're like a novice at the piano who tries a couple of simple tunes, fails, and then throws up his hands in hysteria and exclaims that no one can do it.
Things certainly appear to the senses. Their appearance is very real. And yet, when you begin to analyze the nature of these apperances, you begin to realize that you cannot find where they begin or end. The boundaries between them and other appearances are not really there. There is only a seamless continuum in Nature.
Nature alone is real; everything else is unreal.
If you look at a cup, and say its not inherently a cup (whatever that means) because it is made up of parts that aren't-cups, you are being dishonest.
Try this:
Clench your hand into a fist and look at it. The fist before you is very real. Now straighten your hand. Where did the fist go?
All things are essentially like this - very real, and yet not really there.
You can't say what is a cup and whats not a cup, because the parts of the cup can be mirages too. And the parts that make up the parts are mirages too..etc
So by subscribing to that principle you've essentially lobotomized yourself.
You're not understanding the principle well enough to be making this judgment.
The opposite is, in fact, the case. Keeping one's mind confined within the conventional, empirical mindet is a form of lobotomy. It requires one to discard large tracts of the mind.
Being a philosopher is the best of both worlds. You get to have everything that science has to offer, and you also get to have that marvelous realm of philosophic wisdom which lies beyond science.
I notice ksolway and quinn aren't fans of empiricism and truth based on sense-perception as I am, yet they always borrow from my system whenever they want to talk about anything.
How do you know a fountain lacks inherent existance? Because you used your senses and empiricism to detect and discriminate parts of that fountain.
As has been explained to you in the past, the reference to empirical phenomena, such as a water fountain, is purely for illustrative purposes. The actual proof that all things lack inherent existence is a strictly logical one, and here no reference to empirical phenomena is required.
Perhaps a fountain is simply one necessary movement of a fundamental irreducible substance, and when you percieve its 'parts' that is just your dualistic discriminatory mind seperating things and creating false borders.....Perhaps the fountain has inherent existance...You can never tell unless you borrow from my worldview (that we can use sense data to arrive at truth)...
You say this, even though you know that everything perceived through the senses is possibly an hallucination and that nothing can ever be conclusively demonstrated by empirical methods .....
You don't seem to be aware of the implications of your own philosophy.
Perhaps a fountain is simply one necessary movement of a fundamental irreducible substance,
Nature itself is the only irreducible substance there is.
-
