Existence

[Mindy]

The correct answer, the one alluded to by the conclusions of Objectivism, is that existence is a condition - and where that condition is met there is existence, and where it is not there is nothing. Something/identity/definition of any kind requires that condition being met somewhere/somehow. Note my use of the word 'condition'. Existence is necessarily independent of any of its particular component parts in the sense that it cannot be reduced to any discrete phenomenon.

Response: "Condition," "conditional," and "conditioned" are specifically contrasted with what is absolute. Existence is an un-adulterated state if ever there were one. To put the burden of meaning of what it is to exist on the concept "condition" is surely ill-conceived.

Existence, as what exists, is not independent of its particular components. It is, indeed, reduced to every discrete phenomenon. If you mean existence in the sense of being in existence or being real versus imaginary, there are no component parts.

Original post: Falsification is only a method to broaden the scope of a given concept so that it more accurately refers to something in reality.

Response: What does "more accurately refer[...] to something" mean? Can you give an example?

Original post: Objectivism simplifies it by not trying to answer why/how existence exists, but reduces it to a simple axiom. Existence exists. Only a stunted epistemology, or a non-epistemology could fail to slowly and surely grasp reality. I refer you to the saga of Copernicus for evidence.

Response: Are you saying there can be answers to how existence exists, and why?

-- Mindy

[Plasmatic]

Yes, his position is that consciousness "assimilates" the form, but note that that form is the form of the object. And what is not assimilated is the matter of the object. And no object can have one without the other.

When you imply that Aristotle has erred by not saying "consciousness holds...the object itself," you are speaking nonsense. We do not take the objects we are conscious of into our bodies.

If you would attend to the distinction Aristotle made, and which I have repeated here, you would see that the assimilation of matter is a process akin to digestion. The apple you see stays outside you. The apple you eat enters within.

Now, you need to defend your assertion that my view amounts to representationism.

-- Mindy

When I said "the object itself" I'm referring to direct realism. We percieve the objects themselves not an impression (representation) of them. I didn't in anyway mean we hold the object in the sense organ which would again not be direct realism.( aside from nonsense) This is what I referred to as representation ,that is the wax and ring model as Aristotle meant it ,which you claimed you accepted.

Also I need to refresh but if I recall Aristotle was using the food assimilation to CONTRAST from what he thought perceptual assimilation was.

[Mindy]

When I said "the object itself" I'm referring to direct realism. We percieve the objects themselves not an impression (representation) of them. I didn't in anyway mean we hold the object in the sense organ which would again not be direct realism.( aside from nonsense) This is what I referred to as representation ,that is the wax and ring model as Aristotle meant it ,which you claimed you accepted.

Also I need to refresh but if I recall Aristotle was using the food assimilation to CONTRAST from what he thought perceptual assimilation was.

I said that was the purpose of the food assimilation, said it twice, I believe. But though you may be in "good company," in crying representationalism, there is nothing nearer to that in Aristotle's metaphor than the position that sense-perception is a causal interaction between subject and object.

Aristotle does not say that we assimilate the form of something, then we observe the form we have assimilated. He says that in seeing the object we are assimilating its form. The assimilation is the action of consciousness. That is not representationalism.

-- Mindy

Edited July 24, 2010 by Mindy

[ZSorenson]

Response: Are you saying there can be answers to how existence exists, and why?

-- Mindy

The how is the why (rather than the other way around), but yes. I think that the nature of the conditions necessary for there to be existence/identity can be discovered. Such a discovery would be of the sort that would lead to discoveries in the physical sciences, as well as improve computer science and general sciences such as any that require advanced mathematics (economics, evolutionary theory, statistics).

[Mindy]

The how is the why (rather than the other way around), but yes. I think that the nature of the conditions necessary for there to be existence/identity can be discovered. Such a discovery would be of the sort that would lead to discoveries in the physical sciences, as well as improve computer science and general sciences such as any that require advanced mathematics (economics, evolutionary theory, statistics).

"Objectivism simplifies it by not trying to answer why/how existence exists," (your post of 7-23-2010.) Your grammar says, "...why and or how existence exists." So what is this correction as to "The how is the why..."?

I don't know how to work the multi-quote function here, so I made an awkward post, with most of my responses inside the green box. Did you see them?

The key point is that your referring existence backward to some prior "condition" is groundless and unworkable. It proceeds very like the argument for God, which says the universe HAD to have a creator, so God is evidenced by the universe. (Just in case this needs explication: the premise that says that everything has to have a creator (itself arbitrary) leads one, logically, to then search for who/what created God, and then for who created him, etc.)

Now, you say that Objectivism "alludes" to your idea that existence follows upon some "condition." Could you explain how you arrived at that opinion, that is, what in Objectivism implies or suggests your thesis of a condition? What evidence is there for the existence (well, what else can one say?) of this condition?

-- Mindy

[Grames]

The correct answer, the one alluded to by the conclusions of Objectivism, is that existence is a condition - and where that condition is met there is existence, and where it is not there is nothing. Something/identity/definition of any kind requires that condition being met somewhere/somehow. Note my use of the word 'condition'. Existence is necessarily independent of any of its particular component parts in the sense that it cannot be reduced to any discrete phenomenon.

This is pure bullshit. Note my use of the word 'bullshit'.

A condition of what? The very idea conjures up a meta-reality beyond the existence we know of.

Existence as metaphysical fact consists only of particular discrete things that exist, and nothing else. Existence as a concept derives from and is reducible to particulars.