Preparatory Text 1
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. While this preparatory text is to be published, I will not translate it to Indonesian as I am planning on simply using this text to sketch my ideas. That is the nature of all preparatory texts. What will be translated is of course the Project of Revelation. Remember that the preparatory texts are mostly preparations for the Project of Revelation. So this is not a final work, though it may result in “final ideas” or “final expressions”. The proportional size of paragraphs in this text may be wacky, but I aim to keep a stable size as that is a habit of mine in writing.
There are several
topics in the module which I shall list out here.
· The right way of thinking
· The right way of thinking and thinking
· Significance of Philosophy
· Argument
· Free Will
· Vision
· David Hume
· Immanuel Kant
What is thinking and
what is a way of thinking? These are fundamentally difficult questions, and
even moreso difficult when philosophy is described as the act of thinking about
that way of thinking. So let us get our minds straight first and delve into the
weird ideas of philosophy. While we have 2 final texts written out for us, it
is still difficult as these 2 texts tell us nothing about thought or mind or whatever.
All they speak of is God according to necessary truths. However, the area of
thinking, while analogously present within God, is not completely present
within God in the precise way we are thinking. Our world is contingent and so
there are various ways in which we are not supposed to be.
After thinking a bit
after walking a bit, I need to be able to integrate these ideas into a way that
my thinking is coherent and not just based on commentaries here and there. So
in this preparatory text, I will spend a long time (I almost swore) trying to
combine this idea and that idea all over the place.
There is certainly a
difficulty over the fundamental connection between awareness as the immediate
truth and also every other truth as truths which supposedly should come from the
fundamental truth of awareness. So let us discuss the connection between
awareness and other truths.
The fundamental truths
immediate to us is the existence of awareness and the existence of existence of
awareness. We have also ascertained that by logic, things which have a
beginning must have a cause. As our awareness has beginning, and all awareness
has beginning (excluding God), then objects must at least exist beyond our own
personal awareness. Therefore, transphenomenal existence is true (existence
which goes beyond awareness or phenomena).
The idea that things
having a beginning may be a pure presupposition though, as I have not perceived
a proof that things having a beginning must have a cause. But what does it mean
for something to have a beginning and to be causeless? What does a beginning
even mean? In simplest terms, to have a beginning means that something once
does not exist and now it exists. This is observed as change. Something goes
out of existence and is replaced by something else in existence.
If one can say that everything
can happen without a reason, without causality, that means no inference is
truly possible. For everything can be true without a reason. No logic would be
possible and no reasoning is possible either. This is simply the idea that I
have, but can we at least prove that no causation equals no logic?
First, there is a
difference of the word “reason” between reason as in cause and reason as in
proof, evidence, or epistemic justification. However, there is an intersection
in those 2 usages. When we say that things have no beginning can have no cause,
then we mean that no other state is necessary for the beginning of the
existence of any particular object. However, the idea that there is no state,
not even the object itself, that is conditional for the beginning of any
existences implies that there is no defined condition to begin anything. This
does not even mean that there can be no beginning, but it means there can be no
order at all. Everything would begin and end in without limitations. In other
words, from a simple reflection there is an absurdity if things with beginnings
require no causes.
Let us now investigate
this using logical form.
1. An object may have a beginning without a cause.
2. A cause is the necessary precondition to the
existence of another object.
3. An object that has a beginning but no cause has
no necessary preconditions for its existence.
4. A causal relationship between a cause and an
effect limits the effect to its cause.
5. Without a cause, there is no causal
relationship to limit the object to any cause
6. The object’s beginning is undetermined and may
exist or not exist at the same time.
7. The object exists and does not exist at the
same time.
8. Therefore, the object possess 2 contradictory
states at the same time.
9. Grant that the object possess a state of union.
10. The existence of such union is also
undetermined.
11. Therefore, there is an inherent contradiction
of states. This violates the logical law that any object can only be in one
particular state at any point of existence.
Therefore, the idea
that things with a beginning can have no cause leads to a complete
contradiction of anything and everything. This grounds that only the idea that
all things which have a beginning has a cause can be internally self-coherent. So
we do not need to go to the absurd end that if there is no cause then there is
no logic. However, what is logic based on? Logic is based on proper order of
the intellect and the world perceptible by the intellect. In the absence of
causation, there shall be a total disorder of everything and anything and so
not even a proper thought can be conceived of in correlation to reality, let
alone logic. However, in a sense it is true that we would not be able to infer
anything even if there is proper order, by chance… As the fundamental basis of
inference is causation.
There are indeed
several kinds of inferences, such as causal inferences and categorical
inferences, those 2 the only ones I know of. Categorical inferences are
inferences based on the categorical relationships between members of different
categories. Causal inferences are based on the inferred causal relationship
between a thing and another thing. However, arguably all inferences are categorical,
so how are they related to causation? The categorical inference is related to
causation because categories are all causes of each other’s lack. For example,
the category of car and plane are different as they cause each other to lack
what the other possess. Cars lack the plane shape that planes possess and
planes lack the car shape the cars possess. Granted this is not conventional
causation.
So let’s examine this
in a logical argument.
1. Assume there is no cause and still a proper
order.
2. It is impossible to infer anything is the cause
of anything, for there is no causation.
3. It is impossible to justify anything as
reasoning is precisely the cause of belief.
4. What does it mean to reason?
5. It means to seek the reason of beliefs and
propositions.
6. We seek the reason of belief and propositions
by investigating the propositions which and beliefs which support the
questioned belief and proposition, or by investigating the reality itself.
7. How do beliefs support other beliefs?
8. Beliefs support other beliefs by following
correct structure and being true themselves.
9. What is the fundamental structure of belief?
10. This source of belief states X, therefore X.
11. If X, then Y. X. Therefore, Y.
I concede, the best
way so far is by showing that the lack of causation leads to destruction and
chaos of all order in reality. It will even go so far to mess with God’s
relationship with the created order. In means God lacks something which God
possibly can possess. It contradicts the necessity of God’s omnipotence to
introduce order into the chaos of nothingness. Therefore, all things with a
beginning must have a cause.
Therefore, there must
be a cause outside of our own awareness and so our personal awareness does not
determine reality. Therefore, as said, transphenomenal existence exists. That
is existence going beyond awareness and perceptions. Now we must ask, is there
a one-to-one correspondence between awareness and existence? By the argument of
God, yes, so no further questions asked (I almost swore again). However, by the
argument of God, we must also remember that there is no distinction between
awareness and existence. So there is not just correspondence but also union of
awareness and existence under the Holy Name of Existence or God alone.
Now, to figure out how
we develop truths. We develop truths from the fundamental truths of existence
and awareness by using our prior taught concepts of the world and explaining
them in terms of the fundamental truths. So let us examine the mind and its
processes and attempt to explain them in terms of the fundamental truths.
1. What is thinking?
2. Thinking is the act of perceiving thoughts.
3. Do thoughts exist?
4. Thoughts exist.
5. What are thoughts?
6. Thoughts are recreations of objects outside of
mere perception, that is actual existences.
7. There are 2 interpretations of what thoughts
are.
8. Thought is the awareness recreating objects it
perceives in a lower level.
9. Thought is true but lower level perception of
objects.
10. Are the 2 interpretations of thoughts equally
true?
11. Yes, because awareness is united with the
objects of its perception and so the awareness can recollect or reaccess the
object of its perception anytime it desires.
I shall first
investigate awareness and this requires prose form, not logical form. We had
commonly assumed that the objects we perceive are separate from our awareness.
It is certainly true that at the level of God there is complete union between
existence and awareness. However, we have ascertained that our awareness and
God is separate and distinct. Therefore, there is a real separation at least
between Existence and personal awareness. How do we prove that other objects
are just as separate from our awareness?
Assume I saw a cross. The
perception of the cross began to exist, but did the cross began to exist? It
seems there was a relative actualization of the cross, so relative to my
personal awareness, the cross began to exist. However, relative to other
awarenesses, assuming that there is such a thing as other awareness and
consciousness, they may have always existed. And then there is still the
determinant of existence, God. Now we must ask, what caused the perception of
the cross to begin? Was it God? Was it something else other than God? Well we
know that all contingent objects fundamentally come from God, but in the course
of things it is possible that first objects may be a cause for second objects
and they cause third objects and so on.
Yet as God is the one
who determined the nature of the first objects and all other objects, then in
the end the first cause is God. So we can take the back route and say that all
perceptions are caused by God and that there is no separate object from our
awareness. This is not so incoherent and will lead to no problems. However, the
problem is that when our awareness ceases, it seems that all things cease to be
other than God. Or to say, if our awareness ends, then the perceptions of
finite nature cease as well and God is left alone again.
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