Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Discussion of the nature of Ultimate Reality and the path to Enlightenment.
Locked
User avatar
RobertGreenSky
Posts: 272
Joined: Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:24 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by RobertGreenSky »

No.
User avatar
Diebert van Rhijn
Posts: 6469
Joined: Fri Jun 03, 2005 4:43 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Diebert van Rhijn »

RobertGreenSky wrote:(Btw, not once in 35 years reading have I ever come across any source, whether J. Krishnamurti or any voice in Daoism, Zen, or Buddhism, who ever wrote a damned thing about A = A, not once! You're bullshitting yourself about its significance.)
Perhaps because most of the logic in those traditions, like most of the Naiyanikas, is epistemological, dealing with descriptive knowledge or thinking
about
and hardly ontological,

Since I had J. Krishnamurti lying around on my desk at the moment, I decided to illustrate this:
  • So the thinking, the word, the symbol, the image is knowledge, and that is time.... So all knowledge, obviously, there is no question about this, all knowledge is time. And all knowledge is the past.
When JK is addressing thought and knowledge, it's accumulative thoughts and knowledge, descriptions.
  • Therefore I must be very clear, there must be clarity that there is no deception whatsoever. And I'm saying that deception exists, will inevitably exist if I don't understand the nature of reality.
Yet there seems to be a higher understanding of the nature of reality...
  • But to see the whole field of knowledge, and to see the whole field and where the knowledge is necessary, where it becomes a destructive thing, requires great intelligence. So is intelligence the product of time? Do listen to it. Don't agree or disagree. Is intelligence personal, yours or mine? Or is intelligence the seeing of this whole movement of knowledge? And to see it you must be highly sensitive, attentive, care, affection, love, you must have, otherwise you can't see the beauty, the swiftness of intelligence.
And that understanding is "great intelligence" and "highly sensitive"? What is this intelligence on the nature of knowing?
  • To know myself is very important. I see the limitations of knowledge, I see very, very clearly that the very word `know' is a dangerous word in the sense that it has tremendous associations with knowledge. So what have I left? I have understood the limitations of knowledge, I also see the Anglo-European word `feeling' and the danger of that word because I can invent a lot of feeling and a whole lot of froth. So I can also see the limitations of that. And at the end of this, where am I?
  • Then only is there pure observation which is insight without any shadow of the past or of time. This timeless insight brings about a deep, radical mutation in the mind.
Clearly A=A is as well no accumulative knowledge, it's not in the past, on itself it doesn't tell us anything new about something or contains a specific sense or feeling. It's pure observation and could bring deep changes in the mind if followed through.
Ataraxia
Posts: 594
Joined: Tue May 15, 2007 11:41 pm
Location: Melbourne

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Ataraxia »

RobertGreenSky wrote:
I've presented three sources indicating A = A is disputed in Nagarjuna, two of them directly - that trumps anyone here, in my view. But on Genius Forum does A = A have some special meaning of which Laozi, Nagarjuna, Aristotle, the authors of the quoted materials, and everyone else alive or dead have no knowledge? Has someone put on the Emperor's new clothes?
I don't know whether it has any special "meaning", but it seems to me a pretty handy tool for explaining to people more familiar with western philosophy what Laozi is pointing to in the above stanza regarding contrast that you provided. Moreover it, along with the other two LNC and EM provided a very useful framework for clear thinking for any budding philosopher. I can report that it certainly helped me.

As it happens I'm nearing the conclusion of a formal degree in Western philosophy at the moment and it is a great pity that A=A barely rates a mention there too. Most of my fellow students in the tutorials are the sloppiest thinkers you'd ever come across. So are many of the lecturers. I reckon they would benefit greatly by spending some time understanding that SEP page Diebert linked.

As far as arguing about what Nargajuna did or didn't posit, I leave it to you guys who have read him more widely.
User avatar
Kelly Jones
Posts: 2665
Joined: Wed Mar 22, 2006 3:51 pm
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Kelly Jones »

RobertGreenSky wrote:Zhuangzi often refers to the problem of "That's it, that's not"; when that way of thinking lights up, the Dao is obscured. What is he criticizing? One target is the logical analysis that philosophers go in for, in particular that of the Chinese sophists and Mohists of Zhuangzi's own time. ... Insofar as all thinking tends to alternate between "That's it" and "That's not", between assertion and negation, this type of critique tends to end up incorporating all conceptual thinking, including all that we usually identify as knowledge. This most general understanding is consistent with Buddhist emphasis on letting-go of all concepts and the Zhuangzi passages on mind-fasting, which negates such thinking. Yan Hui "expels knowledge" by learning to "just sit and forget" (ch. 6, 92), and Old Dan teaches Confucius to practice fasting and austerities to "smash to pieces your knowledge" (ch. 22, 132)

- David Loy, Zhuangzi and Nagarjuna On the Truth of No Truth emphases mine.

KJ: I had some chats with a guy who had similar views to yourself. He said that Buddhism and Daoism disproved A=A. His reasoning was this, basically:

1. A is a symbol representing a finite, contrasted thing. It is relative to not-A.
2. Ultimate Reality / Suchness / Tao is: real, not-real, both real and not-real, neither real and not-real
3. "Real", and "not-real" are two finite contrasting things. Therefore, one can substitute "real" for "A", as follows:
4. The Tao is A, not-A, both A and not-A, neither A and not-A.

So, he concluded, A=A is not true, since the Tao is A, not-A, both, and neither.

Is that how your thinking goes?

RL: No.
You quoted David Loy's passages on contrast, where his view is that the Dao is not encapsulated by any finite characteristic. But Loy has done exactly what Chao-chueh did, by concluding that the solution is "mindfasting", ie. emptying the mind of contrasts / thoughts.

A=A is about identifying a thing as what it is, relative or in contrast to another thing.

But here's the thing. A thing is an "A", contrasted with what it is not (here being "not-A")

BUT, since every thing is an A, and every not-A is itself what it is (thus, also A), therefore, everywhere is A. Nowhere exists not-A.

The very reasoning that leads us to see contrast is precisely what enables us to see oneness: namely, the Dao present in all ways. It's the very same law of identity.


[edit: adding quote of Loy. 2nd edit: adding my quote of reasoning about A=A].
User avatar
RobertGreenSky
Posts: 272
Joined: Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:24 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by RobertGreenSky »

Ataraxia wrote:
RobertGreenSky wrote:
I've presented three sources indicating A = A is disputed in Nagarjuna, two of them directly - that trumps anyone here, in my view. But on Genius Forum does A = A have some special meaning of which Laozi, Nagarjuna, Aristotle, the authors of the quoted materials, and everyone else alive or dead have no knowledge? Has someone put on the Emperor's new clothes?
I don't know whether it has any special "meaning", but it seems to me a pretty handy tool for explaining to people more familiar with western philosophy what Laozi is pointing to in the above stanza regarding contrast that you provided. Moreover it, along with the other two LNC and EM provided a very useful framework for clear thinking for any budding philosopher. I can report that it certainly helped me.

As it happens I'm nearing the conclusion of a formal degree in Western philosophy at the moment and it is a great pity that A=A barely rates a mention there too. Most of my fellow students in the tutorials are the sloppiest thinkers you'd ever come across. So are many of the lecturers. I reckon they would benefit greatly by spending some time understanding that SEP page Diebert linked.

As far as arguing about what Nargajuna did or didn't posit, I leave it to you guys who have read him more widely.
I'm very pleased you're near a degree. Where Laozi is pointing to what logic, or perhaps it is 'common logic', cannot apprehend, of what particular good are law of identity, LNC, and EM? Do you need them to understand that the meanings of light and dark must arise together?

Of Diebert's SEP page, that was originally my source - I read Diebert's post.

1. His first source was also originally my source. (Forgive me for answering here.) That source says explicitly:
The law of identity “A is A” is a conviction that things have some identity (whatever it specifically be) rather than another, or than no identity at all. It is an affirmation that knowledge is ultimately possible, and a rejection of sheer relativism or obscurantism. Nagarjuna’s goal is to deny identity.

http://www.thelogician.net/3b_buddhist_ ... ter_01.htm
2. Of the SEP article, I assume paraconsistent logic is a topic in modern philosophy and one must wonder given your admiration for Aristotelian logic whether you would really appreciate it. Thanks however for saying at least something positive about one of my sources - one of the authors of a paper I quoted is at University of Melbourne!

Everything is real and not real.
Both real and not real.
Neither real nor not real.
That is Lord Buddha's teaching.

—Mûla-madhyamaka-kârikâ 18:8, quoted in Garfield (1995: 102), quoted in SEP

I am grotesquely ignorant so how one gets the first line AND the second line AND the third line neatly fitted into A = A would of course be quite beyond me.
Ataraxia
Posts: 594
Joined: Tue May 15, 2007 11:41 pm
Location: Melbourne

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Ataraxia »

RobertGreenSky wrote:
1. His first source was also originally my source. (Forgive me for answering here.) That source says explicitly:
The law of identity “A is A” is a conviction that things have some identity (whatever it specifically be) rather than another, or than no identity at all. It is an affirmation that knowledge is ultimately possible, and a rejection of sheer relativism or obscurantism. Nagarjuna’s goal is to deny identity.

http://www.thelogician.net/3b_buddhist_ ... ter_01.htm
I see your point. I'll look into it further.
2. Of the SEP article, I assume paraconsistent logic is a topic in modern philosophy and one must wonder given your admiration for Aristotelian logic whether you would really appreciate it. Thanks however for saying at least something positive about one of my sources - one of the authors of a paper I quoted is at University of Melbourne!
Good stuff. I hope to do my post grad work there. :)
User avatar
RobertGreenSky
Posts: 272
Joined: Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:24 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by RobertGreenSky »

Ataraxia wrote:
RobertGreenSky wrote:
... one of the authors of a paper I quoted is at University of Melbourne!


Good stuff. I hope to do my post grad work there. :)
I shall hope for you also. :)
User avatar
Dan Rowden
Posts: 5739
Joined: Sun Sep 09, 2001 8:03 pm
Contact:

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Dan Rowden »

For the record, I don't personally give a flying fuck what Nargarjuna or any other dead guy may or may not have stated or implied. I know what A=A represents and the undeniable truth of that. The ontological discernment that things are neither real nor not real etc etc etc etc, is irrelevant to that truth. That truth comes before such things are even considered. It is the basis of all such considerations. Before one can begin to consider what things really are, there must first be things. A=A is about that primary, brute fact.
User avatar
RobertGreenSky
Posts: 272
Joined: Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:24 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by RobertGreenSky »

Dan Rowden wrote:For the record, I don't personally give a flying fuck what Nargarjuna or any other dead guy may or may not have stated or implied. I know what A=A represents and the undeniable truth of that. The ontological discernment that things are neither real nor not real etc etc etc etc, is irrelevant to that truth. That truth comes before such things are even considered. It is the basis of all such considerations. Before one can begin to consider what things really are, there must first be things. A=A is about that primary, brute fact.
Dan, be happy with whatever are your convictions but do forgive me if my sense of what Nag and the other dead guys were getting at motivates me to question your convictions. Unfortunately here Nag and the other old boys say first thing is, there aren't any things - well, that's what they say. 'Dao be dao not Dao' and there you have it.

What I would really like to have, since I am in fact grotesquely ignorant of 'philosophy', is a working sense of what you actually mean by A = A. If it's the 'law of identity' then hurrah! If it's a specialized meaning I'd at least like to know what it is, even if I have to hold my nose. :)
User avatar
Blair
Posts: 1527
Joined: Wed Jul 13, 2005 2:47 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Blair »

RobertGreenSky wrote:I am grotesquely ignorant.
Well done! you got one thing right.
User avatar
RobertGreenSky
Posts: 272
Joined: Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:24 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by RobertGreenSky »

prince wrote:
RobertGreenSky wrote:I am grotesquely ignorant.
Well done! you got one thing right.
I was being ironic. I've read several of your posts. You're not worth reading. Try making an argument instead of pretending you're superior. No one will buy it.
To know how to stay within the sphere of our ignorance is to attain the highest. Who knows an unspoken discrimination, an untold Way? It is this, if any is able to know it, which is called the Treasury of Heaven. (Zhuangzi, ch. 2)
User avatar
Unidian
Posts: 1843
Joined: Wed Sep 14, 2005 7:00 pm
Contact:

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Unidian »

Prince thinks that if he is abrupt, rude, and sarcastic enough, people will believe he's a peer of QRS.
I live in a tub.
User avatar
Blair
Posts: 1527
Joined: Wed Jul 13, 2005 2:47 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Blair »

RobertGreenSky wrote:
prince wrote:
RobertGreenSky wrote:I am grotesquely ignorant.
Well done! you got one thing right.
I was being ironic. I've read several of your posts. You're not worth reading. Try making an argument instead of pretending you're superior. No one will buy it.
I don't pretend, that is your domain. I am superior, but I don't make a song and dance about it.

Your irony is noted, under douchebag who thinks he's something. Tired is what you are, do you have any idea how many ignorant douches I have met in my life like you?
User avatar
Unidian
Posts: 1843
Joined: Wed Sep 14, 2005 7:00 pm
Contact:

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Unidian »

I'd assume at least one, since you probably have a bathroom mirror.

Although Robert and I are not exactly like you - we are neither narcissistic nor sociopathic.
I live in a tub.
User avatar
RobertGreenSky
Posts: 272
Joined: Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:24 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by RobertGreenSky »

I don't pretend, that is your domain. I am superior, but I don't make a song and dance about it.

Your irony is noted, under douchebag who thinks he's something. Tired is what you are, do you have any idea how many ignorant douches I have met in my life like you?

- Prince
Oh, all the douches you've met in your superior precious little put-upon life. Thanks for the argument; your understanding of Buddhism, Zen, and Daoism was ever so wonderfully displayed.
User avatar
Kelly Jones
Posts: 2665
Joined: Wed Mar 22, 2006 3:51 pm
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Kelly Jones »

Robert,

A=A is the law of identity, the basis for the law of non-contradiction and law of excluded middle. Here is my post again, Robert, that you haven't responded to:

A=A is about identifying a thing as what it is, relative or in contrast to another thing.

But here's the thing. A thing is an "A", contrasted with what it is not (here being "not-A")

BUT, since every thing is an A, and every not-A is itself what it is (thus, also A), therefore, everywhere is A. Nowhere exists not-A.

The very reasoning that leads us to see contrast is precisely what enables us to see oneness: namely, the Dao present in all ways. It's the very same law of identity.



.
User avatar
RobertGreenSky
Posts: 272
Joined: Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:24 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by RobertGreenSky »

Kelly Jones wrote:Robert,

A=A is the law of identity, the basis for the law of non-contradiction and law of excluded middle. Here is my post again, Robert, that you haven't responded to:

A=A is about identifying a thing as what it is, relative or in contrast to another thing.

But here's the thing. A thing is an "A", contrasted with what it is not (here being "not-A")

BUT, since every thing is an A, and every not-A is itself what it is (thus, also A), therefore, everywhere is A. Nowhere exists not-A.

The very reasoning that leads us to see contrast is precisely what enables us to see oneness: namely, the Dao present in all ways. It's the very same law of identity.



.
If nowhere exists not-A then nowhere exists A.
User avatar
Unidian
Posts: 1843
Joined: Wed Sep 14, 2005 7:00 pm
Contact:

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Unidian »

The "law of the excluded middle" might as well be called "the law of excluded reality."

Did Buddha, Nagarjuna, and others call it "The Middle Way" for nothing?

By "excluding the middle," A=A and your precious rationally bifurcated Aristotlean logic exclude reality.

A new quaternary logic is needed - and is what was proposed by Nagarjuna in his negative dialectic.

"Not this, not that, not both, not neither." Neither A=A, nor A=B, nor A does not equal A, nor A does not equal B.

Despite this being proposed many, many centuries ago, the West, in its egotism, is still enamored with Aristotle's world-affirming (and ego-affirming) dualism...

And thus, as an unsustainable dualistic society, we are all up shit creek.
I live in a tub.
User avatar
Kelly Jones
Posts: 2665
Joined: Wed Mar 22, 2006 3:51 pm
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Kelly Jones »

RobertGreenSky wrote:If nowhere exists not-A then nowhere exists A.
Yes, that is the next step, It's true insofar as the Totality doesn't exist as such (isn't relative in nature). Notice that this conclusion is reached using the law of identity. It says the Totality is not something that exists (relatively). And then, one can take that conclusion a step further again, again using the law of identity.....


.
User avatar
Blair
Posts: 1527
Joined: Wed Jul 13, 2005 2:47 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Blair »

Unidian wrote:I'd assume at least one, since you probably have a bathroom mirror.
So if I was to to take a knife to your throat, and slit it open, that would be your throat slit.

Not A=A? Not; your throat slit by prince=your throat slit by prince..?

Do you want to try it out.
User avatar
Kelly Jones
Posts: 2665
Joined: Wed Mar 22, 2006 3:51 pm
Location: Australia
Contact:

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Kelly Jones »

Prince, just ignore it if you can. They're only stirring. It's meaningless.


.
User avatar
Unidian
Posts: 1843
Joined: Wed Sep 14, 2005 7:00 pm
Contact:

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Unidian »

So if I was to to take a knife to your throat, and slit it open, that would be your throat slit.

Not A=A? Not; your throat slit by prince=your throat slit by prince..?

Do you want to try it out.
Yeah, I do.

Nice segue into your misanthropic violent fantasies. But trust me, poser, I had you beat at that years before you were born.

Good thing I moved on - although I think your prospects in that regard are grim.

Nice to see Kelly is coming to your defense, though. I guess you really are an accepted QRS now. Congratulations. You won the fish tank behind door #2.

Also, note that Kelly ignored my "meaningless" post that refuted her whole ad-hoc, faux-Western and faux-Eastern worldview.
I live in a tub.
User avatar
RobertGreenSky
Posts: 272
Joined: Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:24 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by RobertGreenSky »

Kelly Jones wrote:
RobertGreenSky wrote:If nowhere exists not-A then nowhere exists A.
Yes, that is the next step, It's true insofar as the Totality doesn't exist as such (isn't relative in nature). Notice that this conclusion is reached using the law of identity. It says the Totality is not something that exists (relatively). And then, one can take that conclusion a step further again, again using the law of identity.....


.
I'm sorry but I don't think you can reason that since individual things don't exist the totality of individual non-existent things must instead exist. If that's what you mean I think you're bullshitting yourself - see Unidian's reference to being up shit creek, and break out the forks.
User avatar
RobertGreenSky
Posts: 272
Joined: Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:24 pm

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by RobertGreenSky »

So if I was to to take a knife to your throat, and slit it open, that would be your throat slit.

Not A=A? Not; your throat slit by prince=your throat slit by prince..?

Do you want to try it out.

- Prince
And where is Dan or David to deal with someone like that?
User avatar
Unidian
Posts: 1843
Joined: Wed Sep 14, 2005 7:00 pm
Contact:

Re: Arbitrary absolutism: the values of the house philosophy

Post by Unidian »

I'm sorry but I don't think you can reason that since individual things don't exist the totality of individual non-existent things must instead exist. If that's what you mean I think you're bullshitting yourself - see Unidian's reference to being up shit creek, and break out the forks.
Indeed, and there's lots to munch on, as "The Totality" is nothing more than the egos of QSJ (yeah, new term - Quinn, Solway and Jones) inflated to boundless proportions. Creating God in their own image is their essential game, as it has been for all fundamentalist religions.

You're gonna need a bigger fork.
I live in a tub.
Locked