What can we gain by sailing to the moon if we are not able to cross the abyss that separates us from ourselves? This is the most important of all voyages of discovery, and without it, all the rest are not only useless, but disastrous.
Thomas Merton, 1915-1968
...the destination?
30 November 2005
29 November 2005
"The world exists but it is not real...
...what do you think about that?
...Ku* is existence without noumenon. It exists but it doesn't exist. There is no substance. I exist, but what does that mean? Is this me, my head, my feet, my skin? No. My cells, body, skin are changing all the time. Every seven years all the cells in our body are completely renewed. Where is me? It's the same for everything in the world, and for the world itself; it has no noumenon, it is ku*."
Taisen Deshimaru Roshi (1914-1982) ABZenD: 180 answers about zen from Master Deshimaru
*Ku - (Japanese) "Emptiness;" ...It is the emptiness of emptiness, it is the emptiness of the circumstances of any situation, and it is the emptiness of yourself.....
...Ku* is existence without noumenon. It exists but it doesn't exist. There is no substance. I exist, but what does that mean? Is this me, my head, my feet, my skin? No. My cells, body, skin are changing all the time. Every seven years all the cells in our body are completely renewed. Where is me? It's the same for everything in the world, and for the world itself; it has no noumenon, it is ku*."
Taisen Deshimaru Roshi (1914-1982) ABZenD: 180 answers about zen from Master Deshimaru
*Ku - (Japanese) "Emptiness;" ...It is the emptiness of emptiness, it is the emptiness of the circumstances of any situation, and it is the emptiness of yourself.....
28 November 2005
a thought...
Does your room really have a view,
Or even a window to look through?
All I want is for you to look inside of you.
Don't be afraid to walk through the door.
Believe it or not, you've opened it.
Chris Cormack, Mind Moon Circle Quartely, Autumn 1992, pp.21
...goes through the door?
Or even a window to look through?
All I want is for you to look inside of you.
Don't be afraid to walk through the door.
Believe it or not, you've opened it.
Chris Cormack, Mind Moon Circle Quartely, Autumn 1992, pp.21
...goes through the door?
27 November 2005
the two abysses...
He who regards himself in this light will be afraid of himself, and observing himself sustained in the body given him by nature between those two abysses of the Infinite and Nothing, will tremble at the sight of these marvels; and I think that, as his curiosity changes into admiration, he will be more disposed to contemplate them in silence than to examine them with presumption.
For in fact what is man in nature? A Nothing in comparison with the Infinite, an All in comparison with the Nothing, a mean between nothing and everything. Since he is infinitely removed from comprehending the extremes, the end of things and their beginning are hopelessly hidden from him in an impenetrable secret; he is equally incapable of seeing the Nothing from which he was made, and the Infinite in which he is swallowed up.
Blaise Pascal, Pensees, sect. II, 72
...
= 
?
For in fact what is man in nature? A Nothing in comparison with the Infinite, an All in comparison with the Nothing, a mean between nothing and everything. Since he is infinitely removed from comprehending the extremes, the end of things and their beginning are hopelessly hidden from him in an impenetrable secret; he is equally incapable of seeing the Nothing from which he was made, and the Infinite in which he is swallowed up.
Blaise Pascal, Pensees, sect. II, 72
...
= ?
26 November 2005
before, during, after...
Before my teacher came to me, I did not know that I am. I lived in a world that was no-world. I cannot hope to describe adequately that unconscious, yet conscious time of nothingness...Since I had no power of thought, I did not compare one mental state with another.
Helen Keller, 1908
...real being or nothingness?
Helen Keller, 1908
...real being or nothingness?
25 November 2005
a difference...
It's a beautiful thing, the destruction of words. Of course the great wastage is in the verbs and adjectives... It isn't only the synonyms: there are also the antonyms. After all, what justification is there for a word which is simply the opposite of some other word? A word contains its opposite in itself. Take 'good', for instance. If you have a word like 'good', what need is there for a word like 'bad'? 'Ungood' will do just as well - better, because it's an exact opposite, which the other is not.
Orwell, George, Nineteen Eighty-Four, [1949] 1989, 54.
...no matter how miniscule, is still a difference.
Orwell, George, Nineteen Eighty-Four, [1949] 1989, 54.
...no matter how miniscule, is still a difference.
24 November 2005
reality, what a concept...
For we shall maintain that no statement which refers to a "reality" transcending the limits of all possible sense-perception can possibly have any literal significance; from which it must follow that the labours of those who have striven to describe such a reality have all been devoted to the production of nonsense.
A.J. Ayer, Language, Truth, and Logic, 1936, 34
"...limits of sense-perception?"
A.J. Ayer, Language, Truth, and Logic, 1936, 34
"...limits of sense-perception?"
20 November 2005
concept of infinitesimals...
The Dichotomy: There is no motion, because that which is moved must arrive at the middle before it arrives at the end, and so on ad infinitum.
The Achilles: The slower will never be overtaken by the quicker, for that which is pursuing must first reach the point from which that which is fleeing started, so that the slower must always be some distance ahead.
The Arrow: If everything is either at rest or moving when it occupies a space equal to itself, while the object moved is always in the instant, a moving arrow is unmoved.
The Stadium: Consider two rows of bodies, each composed of an equal number of bodies of equal size. They pass each other as they travel with equal velocity in opposite directions. Thus, half a time is equal to the whole time.
Zeno of Elea's "Paradoxes," in Aristotle, Physics VI:9, 239b15
...can no time and no space exist?
The Achilles: The slower will never be overtaken by the quicker, for that which is pursuing must first reach the point from which that which is fleeing started, so that the slower must always be some distance ahead.
The Arrow: If everything is either at rest or moving when it occupies a space equal to itself, while the object moved is always in the instant, a moving arrow is unmoved.
The Stadium: Consider two rows of bodies, each composed of an equal number of bodies of equal size. They pass each other as they travel with equal velocity in opposite directions. Thus, half a time is equal to the whole time.
Zeno of Elea's "Paradoxes," in Aristotle, Physics VI:9, 239b15
...can no time and no space exist?
13 November 2005
noumena...
Sect. 32. Since the oldest days of philosophy inquirers into
pure reason have conceived, besides the things of sense, or
appearances (phenomena), which make up the sensible world,
certain creations of the understanding (Verstandeswesen), called
noumena, which should constitute an intelligible world. And as
appearance and illusion were by those men identified (a thing
which we may well excuse in an undeveloped epoch), actuality was
only conceded to the creations of thought.
And we indeed, rightly considering objects of sense as mere
appearances, confess thereby that they are based upon a thing in
itself, though we know not this thing in its internal
constitution, but only know its appearances, viz., the way in
which our senses are affected by this unknown something. The
understanding therefore, by assuming appearances, grants the
existence of things in themselves also, and so far we may say,
that the representation of such things as form the basis of
phenomena, consequently of mere creations of the understanding,
is not only admissible, but unavoidable.
Our critical deduction by no means excludes things of that
sort (noumena), but rather limits the principles of the Aesthetic
(the science of the sensibility) to this, that they shall not
extend to all things, as everything would then be turned into
mere appearance, but that they shall only hold good of objects of
possible experience. Hereby then objects of the understanding are
granted, but with the inculcation of this rule which admits of no
exception: "that we neither know nor can know anything at all
definite of these pure objects of the understanding, because our
pure concepts of the understanding as well as our pure intuitions
extend to nothing but objects of possible experience, consequently
to mere things of sense, and as soon as we leave this sphere these
concepts retain no meaning whatever."
Kant, Immanuel, Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics, 1783.
nou*me*non, |noōmə,nån|
noun (pl. na |nə|)
a thing as it is in itself, as distinct from a thing as it is knowable by the senses through phenomenal attributes.
Oxford American Dictionariese
"...that we neither know nor can know anything at all... and as soon as we leave this sphere these concepts retain no meaning whatever...?"
...can I know "nothing," if I am not by its sphere nor cannot sense it?
pure reason have conceived, besides the things of sense, or
appearances (phenomena), which make up the sensible world,
certain creations of the understanding (Verstandeswesen), called
noumena, which should constitute an intelligible world. And as
appearance and illusion were by those men identified (a thing
which we may well excuse in an undeveloped epoch), actuality was
only conceded to the creations of thought.
And we indeed, rightly considering objects of sense as mere
appearances, confess thereby that they are based upon a thing in
itself, though we know not this thing in its internal
constitution, but only know its appearances, viz., the way in
which our senses are affected by this unknown something. The
understanding therefore, by assuming appearances, grants the
existence of things in themselves also, and so far we may say,
that the representation of such things as form the basis of
phenomena, consequently of mere creations of the understanding,
is not only admissible, but unavoidable.
Our critical deduction by no means excludes things of that
sort (noumena), but rather limits the principles of the Aesthetic
(the science of the sensibility) to this, that they shall not
extend to all things, as everything would then be turned into
mere appearance, but that they shall only hold good of objects of
possible experience. Hereby then objects of the understanding are
granted, but with the inculcation of this rule which admits of no
exception: "that we neither know nor can know anything at all
definite of these pure objects of the understanding, because our
pure concepts of the understanding as well as our pure intuitions
extend to nothing but objects of possible experience, consequently
to mere things of sense, and as soon as we leave this sphere these
concepts retain no meaning whatever."
Kant, Immanuel, Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics, 1783.
nou*me*non, |noōmə,nån|
noun (pl. na |nə|)
a thing as it is in itself, as distinct from a thing as it is knowable by the senses through phenomenal attributes.
Oxford American Dictionariese
"...that we neither know nor can know anything at all... and as soon as we leave this sphere these concepts retain no meaning whatever...?"
...can I know "nothing," if I am not by its sphere nor cannot sense it?
12 November 2005
the other belongs to me...
The other, in so far as he is other, only exists for me in so far as I am open to him, in so far as he is a Thou. But I am only open to him in so far as I cease to form a circle with myself, inside which I somehow place the other, or rather his idea; for inside this circle, the other becomes the idea of the other, and the idea of the other is no longer the other qua other, but the other qua related to me…
Gabriel Marcel, Being and Having, 1949, p. 107
...does existence depend on the other?
Gabriel Marcel, Being and Having, 1949, p. 107
...does existence depend on the other?
11 November 2005
another koan...
The Stone Mind
Hogen, a Chinese Zen teacher, lived alone in a small temple in the country. One day four traveling monks appeared and asked if they might make a fire in his yard to warm themselves.
While they were building the fire, Hogen heard them arguing about subjectivity and objectivity. He joined them and said: "There is a big stone. Do you consider it to be inside or outside your mind?"
One of the monks replied: "From the Buddhist viewpoint everything is an objectification of mind, so I would say that the stone is inside my mind."
"Your head must feel very heavy," observed Hogen, "if you are carrying around a stone like that in your mind."
...does the stone mind?
Hogen, a Chinese Zen teacher, lived alone in a small temple in the country. One day four traveling monks appeared and asked if they might make a fire in his yard to warm themselves.
While they were building the fire, Hogen heard them arguing about subjectivity and objectivity. He joined them and said: "There is a big stone. Do you consider it to be inside or outside your mind?"
One of the monks replied: "From the Buddhist viewpoint everything is an objectification of mind, so I would say that the stone is inside my mind."
"Your head must feel very heavy," observed Hogen, "if you are carrying around a stone like that in your mind."
...does the stone mind?
09 November 2005
words...
Section 29. Words. I have copiously enough spoken of the abuse of words in another place [071] and therefore shall upon this reflection, that the sciences are full of them, warn those that would conduct their understandings right not to take any term, howsoever authorized by the language of the schools, to stand for any thing till they have an idea of it. A word may be of frequent use and great credit with several authors and be by them made use of as if it stood for some real being; but Met, if he that reads cannot frame any distinct idea of that being, it is certain[ly] to him a mere empty sound without a meaning, and he learns no more by all that is said of it or attributed to it than if it were affirmed only of that bare empty sound. They who would advance in knowledge and not deceive and swell themselves with a little articulated air should lay dolor this as a fundamental rule, not to take words for things nor suppose that names in boozes signify real entities in nature till they can frame clear and distinct ideas of those entities. It will not perhaps be allowed if I should set down "substantial forms" and "intentional species" [072] as such that may justly be suspected to be of this kind of insignificant terms. But this I am sure, to one that can form no determined ideas of Chat they stand for they signify nothing at all; and all that he thinks he knows about them is to him so much knowledge about nothing and amounts at most but to a learned ignorance. It is not without all reason supposed that there are many such empty terms to be found in some learned writers, to which they had recourse to etch [073] out their so stems where their understandings could not furnish them with conceptions from things. But yet I believe the supposing of some realities in nature answering those and the like words have much perplexed some and quite misled others in the study of nature. That which in any discourse signifies "I know not what" [074] should be considered "I know not when." Where men have any conceptions, they can, if they are never so abstruse or abstracted, explain them and the terms they use for them. For our conceptions being nothing but ideas, which are all made up of simple ones, [075] if they cannot give us the ideas their words stand for, it is plain they have none. To what purpose can it be to hunt after his conceptions who has none or none distinct? He that knew not what he himself meant by a learned term cannot make us know anything by his use of it, let us beat our heads about it never so long. Whether we are able to comprehend all the operations of nature and the manners of them, it matters not to enquire; but this is certain, that we can comprehend no more of them than we can distinctly conceive; and therefore to obtrude terms where Me have no distinct conceptions, as if they did contain or rather conceal something, is but an artifice of learned vanity to cover a defect in a hypothesis or our understandings. Words are not made to conceal, but to declare and show something; where they are, by those who pretend to instruct, otherwise used, they conceal indeed something; but that they conceal is nothing but the ignorance, error or sophistry of the talker, for there is, in truth, nothing else under them.
John Locke, Of the Conduct of the Understanding, 1706, Edited by F. W. Garforth.
...belong only to the speaker?
John Locke, Of the Conduct of the Understanding, 1706, Edited by F. W. Garforth.
...belong only to the speaker?
07 November 2005
representation...
"[O]ne must distinguish the Object as it is represented, which is called the Immediate Object, from the Object as it is in itself. The latter is purely active in the representation. That is, it remains in all respects exactly as it was before it was represented. It is true that the purpose of representing an Object is usually, if not always, to modify it in some respect. But by the Object Itself, or the Real Object, we mean the Object insofar as it is not modified by being represented."
C.S. Pierce, On Signs, MS 793:14, not dated
...objectively real?
C.S. Pierce, On Signs, MS 793:14, not dated
...objectively real?
03 November 2005
conceptual vagueries...
The nominalist and conceptualist schools regard concepts as subjective, i.e., as products of man's consciousness, unrelated to the facts of reality, as mere "names" or notions arbitrarily assigned to arbitrary groupings of concretes on the ground of vague, inexplicable resemblances.
Ayn Rand, 1990. Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology. Second Edition. New York: Meridian.
"notion" from the Latin notus 'known'
...vague notions? ...known reality? ...facts? or just plain 'inexplicable?'
Ayn Rand, 1990. Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology. Second Edition. New York: Meridian.
"notion" from the Latin notus 'known'
...vague notions? ...known reality? ...facts? or just plain 'inexplicable?'
02 November 2005
formulaic insignificance...
Nonlinearity means the non-superposition of factors or effects; it means there are terms like
X², 2mxy, byz
in the equations, in which x, y and z are variables, b and m are parameters. Nonlinearity is a necessary, but not sufficient condition for the appearance of chaos. Chaos motions must come from a nonlinear system but nonlinearity does not necessarily imply chaos. Piecewise nonlinearity is not equal to linearity.
"A Brief History of the Concept of Chaos", Huajie Liu, (Department of Philosophy, Peking University, 100871, Beijing, P.R.China), 1999-04-12
...or an expression of order?
X², 2mxy, byz
in the equations, in which x, y and z are variables, b and m are parameters. Nonlinearity is a necessary, but not sufficient condition for the appearance of chaos. Chaos motions must come from a nonlinear system but nonlinearity does not necessarily imply chaos. Piecewise nonlinearity is not equal to linearity.
"A Brief History of the Concept of Chaos", Huajie Liu, (Department of Philosophy, Peking University, 100871, Beijing, P.R.China), 1999-04-12
...or an expression of order?
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