there is a fundamental idea in philosophy and theory about being able to ultimately reduce something to something else, becoming subsumed under the domain of the something else. as you know, philosophy consists of 5 main branches (logic, epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and aesthetics). a while back, i was able to prove to my satisfaction that ethics and aesthetics couldn't exist without metaphysics, but not vice-versa (i'm not sure how i did this, but for the sake of my current argument, assume it to be true). then, i think i basically pitted epistemology against metaphysics, with the winner being able to take logic under its wing. i think that the fundamental problem with philosophy, other than the obvious ones of only arriving at a *loose* connection between logic and language and the very ambiguity of language itself, is that these two branches are incompatible, which leads to a theoretical divide. if metaphysics is defined as "investigating the nature of being and the world" and epistemology "is concerned with the nature and scope of knowledge", then it seems to me that epistemology is essentially a self-experienced metaphysics of an objective external metaphysics. i suppose a practical example of this might be how to define thinking -- do you view the mind from the perspective of the independent observer (metaphysical) or the mind of the person being observed (epistemological)? from a material perspective, the fact that our thinking processes are caused by and result in chemical and electrical changes in the body, which in turn impact the external metaphysics of the universe also presents a question as to whether it is an epistemological or metaphysical question. the fact that we need epistemology to understand metaphysics, but at the same time, epistemology would not exist without metaphysics makes for an interesting debate. and i think that's where i originally got stumped.
ok, here we go. thinking causes a person to affect his surroundings, which are defined by metaphysics. in order to establish knowledge, one is unknowingly sacrificing his knowledge of the metaphysical universe on what would be considered a negligible level in order to obtain knowledge about "more important" entities or entities of a "greater value"; knowledge can thus be defined by the intentionality of favoring an endpoint of universals instead of particulars. for example, thinking about a concept might cause me to discover something new in the field of a science -- a universal formula such as e = mc^2 -- whereas watching tv might cause me to think of random correlations and have subtle reinforcements of factual understanding and latent concepts. while the prior would be considered more "successful" at figuring out the metaphysical universe, both acts emit their own "negligible" effects on the metaphysical universe through the chemical and electrical signaling among neurons. so, at present, a person is incapable of having complete control over his or her thoughts because of the negligible effects on the metaphysical universe caused by the act of the thinking in the brain. a true understanding of the universe would require a perfect compatibility between epistemology and metaphysics: the point at which humans could think, and using their intentionality, have their thoughts affect the universe exactly the way they had intended to. this perfect dance, of course, would require intentionality, at a point in time *p*, to be perfect on all levels of thinking, including conscious and unconscious processes -- making people 100% perfect from their side of their relationship with the surrounding metaphysical universe -- and for the surrounding metaphysical universe to be equally in sync with the thoughts of people -- making for a 100% "perfect universe" from its side of the relationship with people. this perfect dance of sorts would seem to bridge the schism between epistemology and metaphysics, with logic falling in place under the new combination of the two philosophical branches. at the same time, this would leave the mystery of consciousness unsolved -- not in the mind-body dichotomy but in the vein of other philosophical questions like the existence god, life, etc. -- but still subsumed under the combined epistemological/metaphysical paradigm.
i previously stated that "epistemology is basically a self-experienced metaphysics of an objective external metaphysics". now that epistemology and metaphysics are combined into one field, one can claim that understanding one's self and thoughts also is understanding the world and vice-versa, thus eliminating the problem of reflexivity. the problem of ryle's regress (e.g. i think that i think that i think that...to infinity) is also solved, because without reflexivity, the definition of the self must be abandoned, causing one's thinking and doing to be one and the same, working perfectly in every possible way with the surrounding metaphysical universe, and thus eliminating the idea of "thinking" period. or, one could equate thinking with doing, but either way it is of only one order, not infinite, as it exists perfectly in sync with the surrounding metaphysical universe. by eliminating the idea of thinking or combining it with doing so as to make the idea of thinking void, any remaining philosophical problems with the mind-body dichotomy (mainly property dualism) become eliminated. as such, consciousness is no longer more mysterious than things in the so-called material world because it is accepted by definition as being part of "the everything"; an analogy would be with how mathematically pi is defined as circumference/diameter even though when it is computed, the digits after the decimal place go on forever. the same is true with consciousness; it is philosophically now defined by being included as a part of "the everything" ("the everything" = the perfect synchronization between epistemology and metaphysics).
and then everything makes sense, except for the fact that "the everything" is only defined at any given instant in time *p*; the lack of the existence of "the everything" prior to its inception and the possibility of it ending -- the perfect dance between epistemology and metaphysics being disrupted for whatever reason -- seems to present a time-based problem for a paradigm that seems to have solved problems in space. in "the everything", causal determinism would be the prevailing theory by default -- this should be obvious if you understand what i have written up until now and therefore i am not going to spend another paragraph explaining why causal determinism is inherent to "the everything" -- and because of this, for "the everything" to occur over a period of time longer than point in time *p*, it would either have to exist continuously across all time and space, or could never occur at all. regarding why i reduced the time of point *p* to either all moments or none, it is because this is the only way my theory is compatible with causal determinism. causal determinism as stated on wikipedia is: "Determinism is the view that every event, including human cognition, behavior, decision, and action, is causally determined by an unbroken chain of prior occurrences." thus, this precludes any "theories of everything" from ever being successful and why we live in a so-called imperfect world, or to be more accurate, universe. but just because we live in an imperfect universe doesn't mean we can't imagine a perfect universe. or can we? according to my theory of "the everything" and the fact that it cannot exist, it seems inherent that perfection can only be imagined if it is in turn realized; in "the everything", there is no discrepancy between imagination and reality. so, it follows that problems of reflexivity and the epistemological-metaphysical divide prevent us from imagining a perfect world. so, in short, this theory i have just espoused allows us to only imagine an "imperfect perfect" universe, not a truly perfect universe. and if this is the case, then does it render the crux of my theory useless? well, philosophically-speaking, no. but according the standards of perfection set by the theory, it does render my theory useless. analogously, this is like math problems that have been proven to be unsolvable; my theory has proven that theories of everything can never be valid.
No comments:
Post a Comment