Category: other

All posts that do not belong in the categories of buddhism or philosophy goes in here. Please check tags for more details about what the post is about.

Differance and the metaphysics of presence

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A is a because it is not b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, q, r, s, t, u, v, w, x, y, or z.

B is b because it is not a, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, q, r, s, t, u, v, w, x, y, or z.

C is c because it is not a, b, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, q, r, s, t, u, v, w, x, y, or z.

And so on until z.

A does not have an inherent meaning, only meaning because it differs to the other symbols.  And by not having an inherent meaning it defers meaning. This is what Derrida had meant by differance. The choice of a different letter but identical pronunciation was to highlight differing, deferring and difference. The implication is that nothing has meaning present unto itself, only meaning via absence. He terms the mistake to think otherwise metaphysics to presence.

Metaphors we live by

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George Lakoff and Mark Johnson’s important work Metaphors We Live By pointed out an aspect of conceptualisation and language – that we must resort literal physical meanings and relationships in order to talk about the abstract.

The employment of metaphors of the real is the only way we can talk about unreal.

Consider these sentences.

  1. He is in the kitchen.
  2. The concert starts in three hours.
  3. She is in the choir.
  4. They are in love.

All sentences employ spatial relation “in” to describe the concepts.

But only 1 is literal or real. Both “he” and “the kitchen” are real things. The person is located in a space. In 2 uses space to talk about time. And 3, and 4 use space to talk about membership and emotional state. While it can be argued that one can use non-space to describe things, it is neither easy, economical, nor natural. In other words, abstract or unreal concepts simply cannot be mentally, psychologically or conceptually manipulated without recourse to the real literal world.

Type and token things

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There are things. Let us call each thing a token. Let us begin with the smallest unit – the atom.

There are unfathomable, countless multitude of atoms in the universe. Yet, as we look at each atom carefully we see similarities and differences between them. Let us call one a and another b. a and b are dissimilar, in fact, so dissimilar that we will continue to call them a and b.

We look at another atom but this one is similar to a and different to b. So maybe we shall call it a1. After a while we have a whole bunch of a grouped together. Here, they can be called A to represent all of the tokens called a. This big A we shall call type that which is a general representation of all tokens.

This A, of course, does not exist in the world, only as a classification or categorisation within the mind of the thinker. It is a concept that becomes a thing by virtue of being the actual letter A. It is in the sign that we mistake it for being real. The concept until being turned into a sign had no reality other than being a process within the mind/brain. The sign makes it “materialise” so to speak.

Furthermore, the person who speaks A has not seen all the tokens of a but generalises this to all the a. A is thus a “rough estimate” of any a mentioned. Even if we are talking about a specific instance of a we cannot help but be drawn into the estimation that is A.

This is the quality of language that is continually (dis)missed, in all language use, ordinary, philosophical, or otherwise.

A piece of paper

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I hold up a piece of paper in front of you.

Question: you see the front of the paper but does the back not exist because you do not see it?

I flip the paper.

Question: does the back (now front) exist but the front (now back) cease to exist?

The inside of my safe

Warren Tang2 Comments

Imagine that last night, I locked one million dollars into my safe.

Question: does the money disappear the moment I close and lock the safe?

This morning, I open my safe.

Question: does the money reappear the moment I open the safe?

Planet X

Warren Tang25 Comments

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?

Brown

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“There is a book on the table. The book is brown. I will accept the book exists. But does the colour brown exist?”

Brown is a wavelength. White light bounces off the book. The characteristics of the book absorb certain wavelengths. What is not absorbed is reflected. Let us call this isolated, reflected wavelength (low-intensity light at 600 nanometres) which reaches our eyes “brown”. The eyes, which are receptive to wavelengths, transmits that information from the retina down the nerves to the brain where it is equated to “brown”.

You see the book. I see the same book. The colour which is reflected corresponds to “brown” in your vocabulary and my vocabulary. But whether we see the same colour in the same manner does not matter. As long as we are talking about the same “thing” is all that is important.

In this sense, we have isolated the property “brown” to be the wavelength and given it this agreed-upon name. The wavelength exists as light, as energy. I would say “yes”, it physically exists.

Statements of non-facts

Warren Tang59 Comments

By simply saying, “God” does not bring God into existence anymore than saying “Harry Potter” will bring this fictional character into existence.

Human beings are very good at creating abstract objects. And indeed we treat ideas and thoughts as objects, often mixing them up with the real objects of the world.

Philosophical triangulation

Warren Tang10 Comments

1.
People ask how can the sensory representation of the physical world be relied upon. They ask how can I be sure that thing I see is there. The question is always framed through the visual sense.

Yet, all senses come into play.

The perceived thing visually will likely be accompanied by sound. If near enough I could probably touch and smell it. And if you are a baby you will likely want to lick (taste) it. In short, verification is never in a single sense dimension.

This kind of sensory triangulation is often forgotten. We do it so automatically that we take it for granted.

Yet the “what if the sun doesn’t rise tomorrow?” question should really be more precise like “what if the sun rises tomorrow and I don’t feel its heat?” The discrepancy between senses should trigger alarm bells.

It could be a dream perhaps. Or am I a man dreaming of being in a physical world, or a man in a physical world dreaming?

Silly question really.

For what elaborate reason would there be for creating this kind of The Matrix illusion?

Give me the red pill, please, and bring on the philosophical sentinels.

2.
The problem then with minds, souls, and spirits is that there is no triangulation other than hearsay. And when there is triangulation to the mind it is always through observation of a body-object.

There is no transference of The Matrix-like I-know-kung-fu data.

Nothing is there … or rather only a movie is there.

The imagination of the brain (not the mind) is what gives us The Matrix (literature and entertainment), Idealism (philosophy), the special theory of relativity (science), and God (religion).

Not only does the brain lead us to astray (as metaphors do), it also leads us sometimes back onto the right path (as metaphors do).

No body, no mind. No mind, dead body.

Warren Tang4 Comments

At the beginning of the internet in the 1980s (mass access anyway) I had started an online persona. It was as though I was a no more than the digital bits. The possibility was that the physical body was of little consequence.

Living online from the 90s my wellbeing deteriorated. Dislocated, I felt lost and insubstantial.

It was during this time that I began to truly ask who or what I am. Is it my body and/or my mind that is the real me? Or is it neither?

Trying all options, I have, by process of elimination, narrowed it down to this — the body plays a huge part as to who and what I am.

The mind supervenes to the body. No body, no mind. No mind, dead body. The mind does not go somewhere at death. It ceases to exist. More accurately, when the physical process ends, being alive ends. The implication is that what we call a mind does not exist as such but is a process of an object, this particular object, the body.

There was an experiment once that tried to observe the change of weight at death as the soul leaves, effectively trying to give the soul a quantitative number. As expected no change was observed. It is like the weight of an appliance with and without the power on.

Some argue that our ability to measure this is simply not sensitive enough. Or it could be it just isn’t there. Given the evidence, the body is more real than the mind. And the mind needs the body to exist.

I play a game of tennis. I do not think a game of tennis.