Planet X

Posted on by Warren Tang

I am the first person to visit a distant and unseen planet called X.

Question: does the planet come into existence the very moment I visit it?

I leave this planet called X.

Question: does it cease to exist the moment I leave it because no remains to see it?

Published by Warren Tang

I write about linguistics and philosophy. I also write poetry and take photographs.

25 thoughts on “Planet X”

  1. I am truly sorry to hear of your loss.

    The other day, you talked about rebirth in one of my live broadcasts. The word “perpetuation” seems a better word to describe the cycle of life and death. The reason is I don’t think the literal lifespan birth-to-death understanding is right. There is the problem of physical improbability, among other problems.

    But the thing that “bugs” me most is perhaps “death” isn’t the word but maybe “end” and “start”. If I am able to end rebirth through enlightenment (that is what enlightenment means) in mid-life then it cannot be death.

    Perhaps then death is a metaphor.

    In this way, I am also able to “see” IN this world – this life – those who are no longer with us. You could say that is my way of seeing spirits.

    I guess we deal with pain and loss, joy and gain in different ways.

    I too cannot help it.

    So this is why it is hard to talk about these things.

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  2. I don’t recall I said exist but I will check.

    A linguistic form may hold more than one meaning. I may well be using exist with two different meanings here.

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  5. If every person’s first encounter with the reality is “there is God” then that would be the reality. But it is not. Their very first encounter with the reality is “there are things”. So that would mean that this is the reality.

    Secondly, I cannot know “running” without knowing the thing that does the running. The ideas are not innate. This includes thinking (mind). They are generalised from the tokens (instances of occurrences) to create the type (the idealised concept).

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  8. It’s been a while since I read Plato. But I think that I where one of my favorite Socrates quotes comes from (but I could be wrong : “where two go, one sees before the other”.

    To what argument are you referring me to?

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  11. I see that. But you are using the word “exist” in both cases. So I think you really shouldn’t be saying that “running” doesn’t exist. Surely it exists or I wouldn’t be able to know what it is.

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  12. You have misunderstood what I am saying.

    If I ask you to show me a man, you can physically show me a man (show me yourself, for example). If I ask you to show me “running”, you can show me the action of “running” (you run as a demonstration), but you are not really showing “running”.

    What you are show me is *a man running* not “running”. To show me running one must always show a man or a dog or a horse or an animal or a thing running, and can never show me just running. In other words, the word “running” alway includes a thing to perform the running, even though it is not said. This is the limitation and deviousness of language.

    So whether a man is running or not does not affect whether he or she exists or not. But whether running exists like a man exists is a different thing entirely. “Running” seems to exist as a thing because it is given the word container “running”. So I would say running exists conceptually, but not physically. And a man exists both physically and conceptually.

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  13. I understand what you’re saying, but I think the word “exist“ is too large a word to be put to use in the way that you were using it. For sure when I use the word exist every day I mean it as a pretty foundational thing. And when I am running I don’t suddenly disappear out of the universe and then appear somewhere else when I’m not running, so I would say that running should be included in what existence is. and when I am running I don’t suddenly disappear out of the universe and then appear somewhere else when I’m not running, so I would say that running should be included in what existence is. I think you’re looking for another term for what you’re describing or for how you’re using it.

    On another point. If I exist, then when I am running, indeed, I am running. I exist running. I could also exist any number of things at the same time also, though. Being and existence might be an intresting project for someone. 😄🤘🏾

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  14. If I ask you to show me what running is, you will not be able to show me “running” as such, only the action of running *through some body*. In this sense *running* (or *thinking*) can not be “isolated” and is not an existing thing. So *mind* is a process of the body as well. *Mind* is not a noun but a verb. Fundamentally, language describes the world incorrectly.

    My philosophy is one of language but bound to ontology, epistemology, and philosophy of mind.

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  15. …but the motions themselves don’t exist ? They are illusions?

    I am not sure how I am able to encounter something that does not exist ? Surely motion exists. No?

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  16. No and no. lol

    Like “running” thinking does not exist. It is a quality (action) of a thing. These particular movements are called “running” and “thinking”.

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  17. So processes exist? Or do they not?

    And, I say that sense is sensible. Sensation is the noun of the process of making sense. Perception also makes sense, just as sense is sensible. But do they exist, or no?

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  18. Do you separate sensation and perception? I certainly do. And I also separate from this conception and signification. These, to me, are separate processes. Processes are not things to me. A process is a quality of a thing in the form of time. The mind is also a process.

    This is why I kind of like Heideggerian “being and time”, as well as Sartrean “being and nothingness”. But I like much better Dogen’s “being time”.

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  19. Lol. Idk really.

    If the mind is an illusion, how could you know if you went to Planet X, anything concerning Planet X, or whether it exists or not? If the mind is an illusion, how can it be trusted at all? Even if we conclude Planet X exists whether I go there or leave, what is making that conclusion ?

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  21. Are you saying that the existence of Planet X is independent of mind, but likewise the mind itself is independent of itself also?

    Or are you saying that the mind does not exist. And so Planet X likewise cannot exist?

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  24. Exactly!

    My question is do we take that nothing exist outside of the mind or do we accept that things do exist independently outside of the mind.

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