Natural Revelation of Awareness and Existence

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end, amen. In the previous writing I wrote of the concept of Necessary Presuppositional Framework. The NPF explained has the general theme of Natural Revelation but it is not so much characteristic of Divine Revelation itself. This is because we can always develop further the NPF, but we need to develop the truths as well in order to obtain deeper understanding of the NPF and also of Natural Revelation itself.

We will begin with an attempt to obtain a truth from the existing NPF. Therefore, we will have the idea or statement and then we will have the precise reasoning of why we have that idea or statement. This is the simple pattern of justification, the belief or idea and its justification or reasoning. There are 2 ways to obtain truth the NPF, that is radical denial and radical acceptance. Both are radical as they both involve denial or acceptance of the state of affairs down to the roots of all things. Radical denial denies everything until there is nothing left and radical acceptance begins with what is there simply. I have once used radical denial but I think it is not the better option, so I will begin with radical acceptance.

Radical or total acceptance sees the world and reality as it is, that there is such a thing as the world and reality. Through radical acceptance, we recognize that we possess awareness. I have ran into trouble using the word “experience”, so I choose the word “awareness” to keep myself safe from the dogmatists. We possess awareness of many things, commonly divided into the external material world and the mental internal world. However, it is important to recognize that the thing which we possess immediately and directly is simply awareness, and not the actual objects. We have awareness of a laptop, of a table, of our own bodies, of our own thoughts and ideas, of our mental realms, but mere awareness cannot entail separate existence of anything else.

What is the reason of awareness? The reason is precisely because we are aware of awareness. We have self-awareness, that is awareness of our own awareness. Therefore, awareness is self-evident and is the only self-evident thing in the entire world. Everything else must be proven with presuppositions or from the self-evident awareness. Now those presuppositions must themselves be proven, otherwise we are to accept that we cannot obtain the truth but rather only possibilities.

What else can we know from our awareness? We know that we cannot derive separate existence from our awareness. However, as our awareness is the most certain object of our awareness, we can derive the existence of our awareness from our awareness. From this we can know that there are 2 types of existences, that is there is such a thing as awareness and there is such a thing as a thing which is. However, what is the precise relationship between awareness and existence? Is existence only awareness or is there existence beyond our awareness?

I will demonstrate that an awareness-only existence is absurd in the meaning that it leads to contradictions. We recognize that awareness has beginning, for example, I don’t always see my table or my laptop. Sometimes I have that awareness, sometimes I don’t have that awareness. Now if awareness is the only existence, that would imply that when I am not aware, the laptop and the table does not exist. However, that is impossible as by principle, the laptop and the table must be contained somewhere else before it comes into existence. Yet if it was contained somewhere, then it exists in some way undetected by our awareness. Therefore it follows that there exists something beyond mere awareness.

That does not completely separate awareness and existence. It is still possible that existence is subject to awareness. What that means is all existences can enter awareness and leave it, or our awareness can detect all of existence. There is also the possibility that the objects outside of our awareness are themselves an awareness of themselves and so what happens is not a separate object being perceived, but instead a separate awareness merging with our awareness. So we have 2 possibilities, either non-awareness objects exist, or all objects are fundamentally awareness. The first case implies a causal relationship between non-awareness and awareness, while the second case implies a unitive relationship between awareness and existence.

What case would imply a clear separation between awareness and existence? The case is an isolated existence which is totally unknowable by any awareness. However, such existence would never enter into our mind even and since it is totally unknowable, it effectively does not exist even to itself as it possess nothing at all, not even the object of nothing and no awareness of its own. Without an awareness of itself, nothing justifies its existence and nothing can approach it or interact with it. Is such a thing possible? There is no logic which opposes it, but it is by effect, non-existent truly.

We can follow the idea of isolated existence to its furthest implications. An isolated existence must lack any knowable properties, such that there is no correspondent truth. Truth must be perceivable by an awareness, otherwise that particular truth belongs to the system of isolated existence. However, if it follows the laws of numbers or mathematics, then its mathematical properties should be possibly known. If we are to go further, then we are to approach something which does not even have a mathematical property, so it cannot be represented by any numbers, which is wholly absurd. Something which has no mathematical property is clearly non-existent, not in the sense that it is not there, but it is the idea of nothingness, the purest of nothingness, that is what an isolated existence is. As such, a regular object is subject to awareness with its truths.

We have established that anything bound by mathematical properties, that is expressable by numbers, are bound to awareness as mathematical form is the simplest form of awareness of an object. As such, the mathematical objects are all either purely awareness or at least causally related to awareness. The next question, how is this relevant to goodness? I admit, that I cannot determine a relevant connection between this problem and goodness. For these are actually simply interpretations of the appearance of reality. Whether reality is fundamentally awareness or not will not affect what we should do with reality.

Nevertheless, we sometimes seek the truth not for its practicality, but because the knowledge itself is good. I believe this relationship between awareness and existence belong to that category of truth, it is not practical but it is simply good to know. Though it would be nice if any of you have insight on the practicality of this truth. Then there is the question of whether it is actually possible to prove which possibility is the truth or not. With the exception of pure nothingness, all objects in so far as they are mathematical are correspondent to awareness. Either because they are all awareness or because they all have a correspondent effect in awareness.

If they are all awareness, then their fundamental nature is as awareness, that there is awareness of all things. If they are causes of awareness then there are some centers of awareness but awareness is not universal. However, there is a problem when they are fundamentally awareness. The problem is that they have a dual nature, that dual nature is first of awareness and second of as the object themselves possessing composition and relationship. The nature of awareness is fundamentally as awareness only, if an object possesses nature extraneous to their nature of awareness, it is not included within the nature of awareness, instead it is their existential nature. Therefore, we must accept that there is an existential nature distinct from awareness, though it might not be separate.

As such, all objects have an existential nature to them, the question is whether all objects have an additional awareness nature or only some objects act as centers of awareness. It seems that this question cannot be answered fully for there is not enough evidence to ascertain whether each object possess awareness or not. It is also inconsequential to our lives and impractical, therefore, it is sufficient to know that there is an existential nature to every mathematical object and that it is possible for them to have an additional nature of awareness or only some have that nature of awareness.

We know what awareness is, but we do not know what existence is. While awareness is undefinable by words, it is known what it is. Existence is a bit more mysterious. However, we know that all things possess an existential nature, what that existential nature is not as clear though. I simply define the existential nature as the nature objects have as the nature they have in distinction to the nature of awareness. However, that does not pinpoint the nature of existence as its own definition. That needs to be defined in the next writing. For now this is sufficient. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end, amen.