Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

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BigBango wrote: July 30th, 2019, 6:05 pmI like what Hereandnow is saying. He manages to describe how things can be categorized differently for the purpose of having different investigative perspectives. Of course that is so important especially for philosophical breakthroughs that cannot happen so easily in scientific research which is so much more controlled through their funding procedures to only take baby steps away from peer agreed assumptions. Whitehead makes that abundantly clear in "Process and Reality". He speculates on sciences mistakes at their foundation, the very false assumptions that come from an over reliance on Aristotelian Metaphysics, the "substance" carrying properties.
Process ontologists posit "absolute processes" (Charlie Broad), "free processes" (Johanna Seibt), "pure processes" (Wilfrid Sellars), "subjectless processes" (Nicholas Rescher), or "unowned processes" (Nicholas Rescher); but I think such alleged entities are ontologically incorrect reifications of dynamic verbs such as "to flow", because there cannot be any flowing without something that flows. I haven't yet seen one convincing example of a process that doesn't involve any thing(s) or stuff(s), have you?
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

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Tamminen
This is exactly the reason why consciousness is not part of the unity you proposed. In fact it is the only field of study that does not fall under unified science. All the others you mention do, and I like the way you describe their unity. But consciousness, belonging to the field of immanence, does not fit into the picture at all. You say: "Consciousness is what the world "does" when it is structured in such and such a way." This is misleading, because it starts from transcendence. If you had written: "Consciousness is what the subject "does" when the world is structured in such and such a way", it would have been understandable, because the world does not produce anything like consciousness, however it is organized or structured, if there is no subjectivity already as a component of the original ontological structure of reality. Only the subject can "produce" consciousness. Its body is its instrument for that, its instrument for existing. It lives in the material world by means of its material body. The difference between transcendence and immanence cannot be overemphasized, not even in doing science in practice. Saying that consciousness is part of the world is just wrong, except perhaps metaphorically, as opposed to saying that living organisms are part of the world and part of the Earth, which is proper and correct. Maybe I see this a bit differently than you.
I simply don't think there is any reason not to think there is some compatibility between what is ontically defensible, this de Chardin extension of the exterior to the exterior, and Husserlian transcendental ego. Phenomenologically, there is, by Heidegger's lights, no good reason to talk about such a thing at all. It never makes a showing, and all we ever witness is what does. It comes down to what it revealed in the reduction, and this, in my thinking, makes matter come down to the significance or the meaning of consciousness, not the theoretical ontology, which doesn't matter at all. Analyze it as a concept and all you get is the same kind of categorical distinctions derived from the ontic arguments.

I say it doesn't matter because it really doesn't, any more than it matters that physics is distinct from biology, because all terms are merely pragmatic attempts to resolve and their "truth" lies within the body of theory that actualizes them, validates them. Levinas would agree, following Heiddegger: language brings forth the world and is constrained by the resistance the "discloses" but still, it is through dasein only that meanings come forth. Even at the level of ontology this is true. Thus, are left with only one division: the same and the other (metaphysics) at the level of basic assumptions. Levinas was, of course, mostly interested in ethics, which is first philosophy for him, but it applies to all that is mine. All of MY synthesized thoughts trying to assimilate, and since dasein is a shared ontology, since language and culture are shared, the MINE is ours, and the assimilation takes on a political dimension. It is the basis for war: this desire to assimilate into the same, to totalize.

But L understands that we Heideggerian, Nietzschean wielders of power to achieve who we really are, to realize our greatness are bound to Others ethically. This takes the matter to the one place that really does matter, which is mattering itself: Ethics and value are the only "absolutes" and I ground my ontology not in Heidegger's phenomenological structures of being in time, which are fascinating, but, with Kierkegaard (who held Levinas' "Same" to be what he called inherited sin) and Levinas, in value and ethics. For all the talk and theory, the one thing that upends attempts to understanding what it is to be a person is the application of a lighted match to the tip of my finger: phenomenologically speaking, what IS that? And what is love, and bliss. It is, Levinas told Derrida before his death, the holy that most captivated him. I think in part this was because suffering simply could not stand alone. Simon Critchley in his "Less, Less...Almost Nothing" had it right: it is not suffering, which is bad enough, but suffering with no ethical counter weight, no reason at all, just sitting there as something Being simply does....insane and impossible.
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

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Consul
Process ontologists posit "absolute processes" (Charlie Broad), "free processes" (Johanna Seibt), "pure processes" (Wilfrid Sellars), "subjectless processes" (Nicholas Rescher), or "unowned processes" (Nicholas Rescher); but I think such alleged entities are ontologically incorrect reifications of dynamic verbs such as "to flow", because there cannot be any flowing without something that flows. I haven't yet seen one convincing example of a process that doesn't involve any thing(s) or stuff(s), have you?
Or give John Caputo's Radical Hermeneutics a read.
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

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that should read, "exterior to the interior" above.
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

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Hereandnow wrote: July 31st, 2019, 9:38 pm
Consul
Process ontologists posit "absolute processes" (Charlie Broad), "free processes" (Johanna Seibt), "pure processes" (Wilfrid Sellars), "subjectless processes" (Nicholas Rescher), or "unowned processes" (Nicholas Rescher); but I think such alleged entities are ontologically incorrect reifications of dynamic verbs such as "to flow", because there cannot be any flowing without something that flows. I haven't yet seen one convincing example of a process that doesn't involve any thing(s) or stuff(s), have you?
Or give John Caputo's Radical Hermeneutics a read.
You are right Consul. There is no "flowing" that does not involve "things". That is, as Tamminen claims, the ontological connection between subject and object.

Your problem is that you want to explain all flow in terms of our current scientific understanding of the flow of the nature of matter that is only 10% of the mass of our universe. Your categories of exploration suffer from that narrow grasp of reality. In order to break out of those simplistic categories of biology 101 you need to embrace and test for other interpretations that includes fitting both dark matter and dark energy into the picture.

The BB as currently understood is a huge violation of the 2nd law of thermodynamics. So much order from nothing might suggest to you that we just do not understand the nature of "so-called nothing". Again, I recommend to you that you investigate fractals.
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

Post by Tamminen »

Hereandnow wrote: July 31st, 2019, 9:36 pm ...it is through dasein only that meanings come forth
This is the key sentence of philosophy. What "is" dasein? It means "being there" or "being here". Who is here? I am. As Heidegger quite clearly says, dasein is always referring to the current subject: it is "mineness", "je meinig". This is also the metaphysical "I" of Wittgenstein. And it is true that it never expresses itself because it does not belong to the world, but we cannot have any rational ontology without it. And it discloses itself in phenomenological intuition, as it did for Hussserl. I am not sure why Heidegger rejected it, or if he really did, I think he only asked what kind of a "positus" it is. And it is true that it cannot be posited in the usual meaning of the term. Husserl saw it as a kind of a phenomenological residue. But for me it is the most important "residue" there ever can be. Remove the subject, or give it away, as Levinas suggested, and nothing is left. In this world nothingness would not be a bad alternative, but unfortunately nothingness is logically self-contradictory. We cannot escape existence. This is our tragedy. Even Levinas could not get out of this with his ethics and genuine transcendence, nor did Kierkegaard, they only deepened the tragedy because of the irrational and dogmatic elements in their views. This is the pessimist in me talking. The optimist says: just go on living, everything is as it is and cannot be otherwise. This is how Spinoza saw things. Animals have their natural faith, so why not we? The world may come to an end, but existence is eternal. This is my optimism. Or pessmism. Or realism. Or naivism.

I hope this clarifies why I see the subject so important, as the ontological Absolute. Seeing it this way has far-reaching metaphysical consequences. Transcendence becomes immanence. Levinas would not dare say this. Kierkegaard would not dare say this. They saw clearly, but stopped half-way. We all stop half-way.
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

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BigBango wrote: August 1st, 2019, 1:13 amYour problem is that you want to explain all flow in terms of our current scientific understanding of the flow of the nature of matter that is only 10% of the mass of our universe. Your categories of exploration suffer from that narrow grasp of reality. In order to break out of those simplistic categories of biology 101 you need to embrace and test for other interpretations that includes fitting both dark matter and dark energy into the picture.
Is there any scientific reason to believe that a materialistic explanation of consciousness needs to take dark matter into account?
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

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Tamminen
What "is" dasein? It means "being there" or "being here". Who is here? I am. As Heidegger quite clearly says, dasein is always referring to the current subject: it is "mineness", "je meinig".
But for Heidegger, mineness is not a soul. It is a gathering of proximal language for a particular occasion, like when we refer to ourselves or make a claim to possession. A true phenomenogy has to stay the course: it is what is there in the showing up, and the soul never shows up. Husserl exceeded the boundaries of what is eidetically and intuitively present. The reason why, I should quickly add, I am his ally is because within the reduction, his epoche, there is revealed something extraordinary in the "presence" of things; there emerges what has been called a verticality: something higher, a depth, a profundity in the reduced encounter, as if the normal lived life has been mistaken in it dealings with the world. It's as if beneath the language and practicality that ceaselessly owns us there is this hidden depth that has always been there, but ignored.

But: Is there warrant to talk about ontological distinctions? Is this not ontology, but epistemology, and the way objects are received are is not due to a difference is being, but one in relation? In the act of implicit knowing that occurs all the time there is a foundational error.
This is also the metaphysical "I" of Wittgenstein. And it is true that it never expresses itself because it does not belong to the world, but we cannot have any rational ontology without it.
But W explicitly denied this more than once in the Tactatus. One does find religion to be front and center, but this is an ethical matter and cannot be reasoned. He is absolutely right about this: the positing of a transcendental ego rests not with ontology, but with value/ethics-in-Being: "the good lies outside of the space of facts." He was acutely aware that the importance of anything issues from a very strange and unanalyzable "value", the dimension of putting a lighted match to your finger and in the exhaustive empirical/factual analysis of the pain event coming up short entirely in identifying the "badness' of it. Ethical badness is transcednental, not factual, not empirical.

To me there is an argument for the soul emerging: the depth of the epoche's verticality, the unseen dimension of value-in-the-world, the call for redemption of agent-local suffering: it is HER pain when the flames rose to her feet as she was burned alive at the stake. Not mine, but hers elusively, and this cannot logically" stand in the world, I would argue. It is thoughts like this that drove Wittgenstien to religion. (Of course,the case could be made that the ethical/value dimension in our lives establishes an indication of a distinct difference in ontology.)
And it is true that it never expresses itself because it does not belong to the world, but we cannot have any rational ontology without it. And it discloses itself in phenomenological intuition, as it did for Hussserl. I am not sure why Heidegger rejected it, or if he really did, I think he only asked what kind of a "positus" it is.
I'm not sure what positus means, but as to its not belonging to the world, it opens up a very big can of worms that cannot be opened up here beyond the scratch of the surface. It is the problem of hermeneutical enclosure. (Pls keep in mind that I am on your side as you agree with Levinas or Kierkgaard, but, speaking of Kierkegaard, it could be put briefly like this: Look at K's Repetition. His conclusion is the the only way to freedom from sin and unity with God and authentic living is to, a) discover the actuality of the eternal present, and b) exercise the freedom from what will later become H's das man, from unreflected participation (Foucault's ventrilloquizing of history and Kierkegaard called inherited sin). This is, in a sense, freedom from time itslef, but then, that is impossible: repetition (of language, ideas, culture,and so on) cannot be ex nihilo. One is here always already (to anticipate Heidgger) and to exist is to be in time, in memory. K says to be with God we must repeat, not merely recollect. Repetition is beginning each event as if the act issued from the eternal present. All things fresh and new in the light of God, the soul.
Time is hermenuetically structured. Those memories that anticipate future possibilities are, in their employment, what time is. The problem with Husserl's transcendental ego is finding it not intuitively, but in the equation of time: one cannot be conscious SIMPLY. Consciousness, awareness is informed by the past as to what to sya, how to think, what language to use, what idioms, what utterances, the shape of the proposition itself--awareness cannot be removed from these, because it wouldmean removing experience itself. The self, say Heidegger, along with all things, is equiprimordial: there is no one thing, for the apprehension of one thing is a complexity. This is the problem posed by hermenuetical entanglement of "presence": can sense ever be made out of such a term at all?? Presence implies a singularity, and the epoche is like this: in the objects full eidetic disclosure, it is very complex, yet Husserl holds this to be acknowledged as a kind of intuited singularity observed in the eidetic reduction. Heidegger thought this was like walking on water.
Remove the subject, or give it away, as Levinas suggested, and nothing is left. In this world nothingness would not be a bad alternative, but unfortunately nothingness is logically self-contradictory. We cannot escape existence. This is our tragedy. Even Levinas could not get out of this with his ethics and genuine transcendence, nor did Kierkegaard, they only deepened the tragedy because of the irrational and dogmatic elements in their views.
I am not clear on the dogmatic elements of their views. K did have these, I think, and they were the religious affinities he had. Heidegger called him a religious writer. Of course, he then proceeded use K in his work. But k was a critic of dogmatism of the "they" as Heidegger would call it. He called for an authentic Christiality whereby faith took center stage and did not yield to the "sin" of just hanging around and doing what others did, paying more attention to their pocket book or the liturgy at church than to the living God.
Levinas' dogmatism?
I hope this clarifies why I see the subject so important, as the ontological Absolute. Seeing it this way has far-reaching metaphysical consequences. Transcendence becomes immanence. Levinas would not dare say this. Kierkegaard would not dare say this. They saw clearly, but stopped half-way. We all stop half-way.
I disagree with this. The Same is assimilating self turning others into things. L put within immanence metaphysics. It is there in the Desire, in ideatum that exceeds the idea. He is playing off heidegger's position that language is the house of Being: this ignores the metaphysics that cannot be grasped by language and leaves the Other at the mercy of the self realization of the Same. The face of the Other is the metaphysical calling to ethical responsibility. Metaphysics is, if you will, more primordial than than language. L sees all of our thinking trailing into infinity, and infinity inherent in all things. I like him because I believe this: take any Thing at all, put analysis to it and you quickly find yourself lost. It matters not when it comes to "is there a lamp on the table?", but in "shall I torture these people?" it is everything. Our true self is absent. this cold be read as a call for an ontological idstinction, but I see the matter as K did: What is Really going on is transcendental, and this is an epistemological matter.

Sorry for all the writing. As I said, I write for myself, and I appreciate our exchange for chance it gives me to clarify what I think and for the challenge it presents.
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

Post by Tamminen »

Hereandnow wrote: August 1st, 2019, 12:11 pm But for Heidegger, mineness is not a soul.
Nor is it for me.
Husserl exceeded the boundaries of what is eidetically and intuitively present.
I think I can "see" the fundamental ontological necessity of the transcendental subject in my phenomenological intuition.
It's as if beneath the language and practicality that ceaselessly owns us there is this hidden depth that has always been there, but ignored.
Yes, I have called it subjectivity. And this is ontology and epistemology. They cannot be separated here, I think.
But W explicitly denied this more than once in the Tactatus.
Perhaps we have different views about what ontology is. For me it is not only about what there is in the world. The subject does not belong to the world, but is an essential component of any rational ontology, as I have said. Ontology, for me, is not only about being as such, but also about what is the preconditon of being. The subject is not any kind of being in the ordinary sense. It is one of the two "godheads" of Wittgenstein. It belongs to the most general and fundamental ontological structure of reality as a key component. But it is an abstraction in itself, becoming concrete in the structure 'subject - consciousness - world'. Looks simple, but needs some phenomenological insight to assume.
Levinas' dogmatism?
Not much, I think. As I said, I was just reading a couple of his short texts for the first time in my life. He sees the Bible as the unique text where transcendence has left its "trace". So he had the same kind of view as Kierkegaard about the revelation of God in the Bible. I just wonder what he would have said of this if he had been born in India, for instance. Our cultures make us dogmatic, in a sense.
I disagree with this. The Same is assimilating self turning others into things. L put within immanence metaphysics. It is there in the Desire, in ideatum that exceeds the idea. He is playing off heidegger's position that language is the house of Being: this ignores the metaphysics that cannot be grasped by language and leaves the Other at the mercy of the self realization of the Same. The face of the Other is the metaphysical calling to ethical responsibility. Metaphysics is, if you will, more primordial than than language. L sees all of our thinking trailing into infinity, and infinity inherent in all things. I like him because I believe this: take any Thing at all, put analysis to it and you quickly find yourself lost. It matters not when it comes to "is there a lamp on the table?", but in "shall I torture these people?" it is everything. Our true self is absent.
I can agree on most of what you say here, but this is not incompatible with what I wrote. We just have to go further and see that the ethical absolute, or genuine transcendence, is for us, for immanence. How else can it be? Could there be God without us?
As I said, I write for myself
So do I.
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

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Tamminen wrote: August 1st, 2019, 2:11 pm Could there be God without us?
If there is God, as a metaphor for transcendence, our relationship with Him must be something as paradoxical as this:

God wondered if He should create the world or not. He decided not to do it. But now Man got furious: ”What kind of a Creator are you, not doing what you are supposed to do! Create me at least!” So God had to create Man and the world for him to live in.

I picked this from one of my own texts.
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

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Hereandnow wrote: August 1st, 2019, 12:11 pm I'm not sure what positus means
Merriam-Webster, definition of 'posit': to assume or affirm the existence of : postulate, from Latin positus, past participle of ponere.

As Wittgenstein remarked, the subject cannot be complex, therefore it is "metahysical" or "transcendental", not anything that can be "posited" in the usual sense of the term. I think it was because of this that Heidegger had doubts about the meaning of Husserl's transcendental ego. Still it has to be assumed, as the reference point of all being. It is not what I am, but that I am.
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

Post by Felix »

Tamminen said: As Wittgenstein remarked, the subject cannot be complex


In what sense can it not be "complex"?
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

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Felix wrote: August 2nd, 2019, 1:39 pm
Tamminen said: As Wittgenstein remarked, the subject cannot be complex


In what sense can it not be "complex"?
A complex or composite subject would have properties, but the metapysical subject is just the reference point of consciousness of the world. We cannot say that it is "such and such". Its consciousness varies of course, and the "pictures of facts", to use the terminology of Tractatus, are of course complex.
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

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Tamminen
I think I can "see" the fundamental ontological necessity of the transcendental subject in my phenomenological intuition.
Ok, but it's very hard to show this, because the proof of this does not lie in objective analysis. It lies in exercising, if you will, the experience of Being subjective as such. If one goes about it looking at the data one gets caught in the illusion of what Heidegger would call the equiprimordial self, which means the hermeneutical complexity that goes into examining what thought is. No thought is stand alone, and when we think about the self, the I,we will always get a structured concept because all thinking, all ideas have their meanings played off other ideas, the binary opposites, the traces heard tell about in Derrida (Derrida is next for me to take on. He is very important not because of his annihilation of truth and knowledge, but...no, it is because of his annihilation of truth knowledge: the means to enlightenment is the Eastern way (not to put too fine a point on it), what the Hindus call neti neti and what the West call apophatic theology. It is the way of meditation -Which cancels the world- and the "end" of philosophy-given that there is nowhere to go from here analytically; it's done! Like Jesus said, true disciples hate their parents! We all know what he means: give up your most precious connections to this world (that dasein. Kierkegaard sees this) to be free to pursue God (putting aside all of the attendant issues here). One will never get anywhere at all through analysis unless analysis is treated as a process of annihilating human dasein.
Yes, I have called it subjectivity. And this is ontology and epistemology. They cannot be separated here, I think.
I think the issue of ontology at this point just becomes undone altogether. It all comes down to epistemology: Our "knowledge" of the world is not an abstraction, but is dynamically inhibiting realization. Ontology? What do we know of the Being of ANYTHING once dasein becomes the problem? For it is in dasein that speculation about dasein's equiprimordialism takes place. The question no longer is, what is it? For language does not address the "what" of things, only the how; and hermeneutically we are locked in a "how", that is, the Heraclitean flux of time.
Perhaps we have different views about what ontology is. For me it is not only about what there is in the world. The subject does not belong to the world, but is an essential component of any rational ontology, as I have said. Ontology, for me, is not only about being as such, but also about what is the preconditon of being. The subject is not any kind of being in the ordinary sense. It is one of the two "godheads" of Wittgenstein. It belongs to the most general and fundamental ontological structure of reality as a key component. But it is an abstraction in itself, becoming concrete in the structure 'subject - consciousness - world'. Looks simple, but needs some phenomenological insight to assume.

Wittgenstein was emphatically against transcendental talk, which is why he called his Tractatus nonsense. He was, on the other hand, convinced that the world was not stand alone, as I have noted often in my posting. he will ne er talk about transcendental ontologies, but he will yield, as I read in his Culture and Value, to the powerful impositions made on us by ethics, value, mysticism. I will read about the Godheads statement and get back to though. Needs context.

I will concede you point that we do not belong to the world, but it is because we are not a thing, but rather, a valuative agent: we delight and we suffer. As to the ontological distinction this warrants, well, it depends. Maybe the "energy" (shakti?) that IS what objects are (matter is energy?) just manifests differently in us? Look, this sounds like a bit of speculative drivel. But if objects are the same as energy or "force" and there is not a physicist ever who can tell you what a force is, then the whole affair is metaphysical extravagance.
Not much, I think. As I said, I was just reading a couple of his short texts for the first time in my life. He sees the Bible as the unique text where transcendence has left its "trace". So he had the same kind of view as Kierkegaard about the revelation of God in the Bible. I just wonder what he would have said of this if he had been born in India, for instance. Our cultures make us dogmatic, in a sense.
Good point. He was born into a Western religion, but he knew this. I am sure he would never say there is only one true view in religion. Totality and Infinity is not about popular religion at all. He likely had two worlds, as all good thinking people should: an ontic one in which we play out our given roles, and an ontological one in which we "suspend" all this and redefine everything at the level of basic questions.
Anyway, I think in the end, we drop them all; we drop the self. I am not convinced we drop the ,er, trascendental self. Very difficult to talk about this without presupposing a language for it, which is why W would never talk about it.
Could there be God without us?
The Zen master's fan just went flying at you, and me, for all I have said. I truly think we are being "told" by the world to shut up, disentangle yourselves from the things you love, hate and habituate, moor your yoga boat to the dock and move on.

Here is a post modern blasphemy: God is love. Love is a given, like pain, not reducible any other language bits. Of course, the moment your understanding starts talking about it, then we are in Heidegger's world of human dasein, which is really a major feature of his philosophy: there is NO way out of this. Language gives us meaning, it is the house of Being. He thought that ideas bring forth the world (but then there is that puzzling interview about Buddhists......)
But this is just more talk....
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Re: Whatever Consciousness is, it's Not Physical (or reducible to physical).

Post by Tamminen »

Hereandnow wrote: August 3rd, 2019, 10:13 am It lies in exercising, if you will, the experience of Being subjective as such.
Exactly, and in this exercising it is possible to see the absolute nature of subjectivity. This is completely independent of hermeneutics. It is not about the meaning of the being of Dasein, it is the being of Dasein as it is already presupposed before all interpretations, its "that-it-is" or "that-I-am". I think Husserl was close to what I think about it. The subject, in the sense he and Wittgenstein spoke about it, is the subject of temporality, the "I am" that remains the same as time goes on. Being is subjective and temporal. The subject, as I see it, is also independent of ethics. Wittgenstein said that ethics is transcendental, but what he meant by the metaphysical subject is perhaps a bit different, something that I would call ontological, not ethical. However, it is difficult to try to interpret what really was in his mind as to the relationship between ontology and ethics. What I mean by the subject is, as I wrote, not what I am, but that I am. This reminds us of what Wittgenstein said about the world: there is nothing mystical in what it is like, but that it is, is mystical. Those two mystical poles of our existence are the two "godheads" of W. in his Notebooks. Remember my "trinity". My view is that the origin of genuine philosophy and also what religion is about, the reason of its being, is the pre-ontological understanding of the deep existential dimensions of subjectivity: seeing the paradoxes of death and foreign experiences. I think the subject is universal and eternal, the eternal present in the truly fundamental-ontological sense, in my interpretation of what ontology is.
The question no longer is, what is it?
As I said, we cannot say what it is, because it is nothing in itself. It just is. We cannot get rid of it. I cannot get rid of myself even if I wanted. Even suicide does not help. This goes deep.
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by John K Danenbarger
January 2023

Mark Victor Hansen, Relentless: Wisdom Behind the Incomparable Chicken Soup for the Soul

Mark Victor Hansen, Relentless: Wisdom Behind the Incomparable Chicken Soup for the Soul
by Mitzi Perdue
February 2023

Rediscovering the Wisdom of Human Nature: How Civilization Destroys Happiness

Rediscovering the Wisdom of Human Nature: How Civilization Destroys Happiness
by Chet Shupe
March 2023

The Unfakeable Code®

The Unfakeable Code®
by Tony Jeton Selimi
April 2023

The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are

The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are
by Alan Watts
May 2023

Killing Abel

Killing Abel
by Michael Tieman
June 2023

Reconfigurement: Reconfiguring Your Life at Any Stage and Planning Ahead

Reconfigurement: Reconfiguring Your Life at Any Stage and Planning Ahead
by E. Alan Fleischauer
July 2023

First Survivor: The Impossible Childhood Cancer Breakthrough

First Survivor: The Impossible Childhood Cancer Breakthrough
by Mark Unger
August 2023

Predictably Irrational

Predictably Irrational
by Dan Ariely
September 2023

Artwords

Artwords
by Beatriz M. Robles
November 2023

Fireproof Happiness: Extinguishing Anxiety & Igniting Hope

Fireproof Happiness: Extinguishing Anxiety & Igniting Hope
by Dr. Randy Ross
December 2023

Beyond the Golden Door: Seeing the American Dream Through an Immigrant's Eyes

Beyond the Golden Door: Seeing the American Dream Through an Immigrant's Eyes
by Ali Master
February 2024

2022 Philosophy Books of the Month

Emotional Intelligence At Work

Emotional Intelligence At Work
by Richard M Contino & Penelope J Holt
January 2022

Free Will, Do You Have It?

Free Will, Do You Have It?
by Albertus Kral
February 2022

My Enemy in Vietnam

My Enemy in Vietnam
by Billy Springer
March 2022

2X2 on the Ark

2X2 on the Ark
by Mary J Giuffra, PhD
April 2022

The Maestro Monologue

The Maestro Monologue
by Rob White
May 2022

What Makes America Great

What Makes America Great
by Bob Dowell
June 2022

The Truth Is Beyond Belief!

The Truth Is Beyond Belief!
by Jerry Durr
July 2022

Living in Color

Living in Color
by Mike Murphy
August 2022 (tentative)

The Not So Great American Novel

The Not So Great American Novel
by James E Doucette
September 2022

Mary Jane Whiteley Coggeshall, Hicksite Quaker, Iowa/National Suffragette And Her Speeches

Mary Jane Whiteley Coggeshall, Hicksite Quaker, Iowa/National Suffragette And Her Speeches
by John N. (Jake) Ferris
October 2022

In It Together: The Beautiful Struggle Uniting Us All

In It Together: The Beautiful Struggle Uniting Us All
by Eckhart Aurelius Hughes
November 2022

The Smartest Person in the Room: The Root Cause and New Solution for Cybersecurity

The Smartest Person in the Room
by Christian Espinosa
December 2022

2021 Philosophy Books of the Month

The Biblical Clock: The Untold Secrets Linking the Universe and Humanity with God's Plan

The Biblical Clock
by Daniel Friedmann
March 2021

Wilderness Cry: A Scientific and Philosophical Approach to Understanding God and the Universe

Wilderness Cry
by Dr. Hilary L Hunt M.D.
April 2021

Fear Not, Dream Big, & Execute: Tools To Spark Your Dream And Ignite Your Follow-Through

Fear Not, Dream Big, & Execute
by Jeff Meyer
May 2021

Surviving the Business of Healthcare: Knowledge is Power

Surviving the Business of Healthcare
by Barbara Galutia Regis M.S. PA-C
June 2021

Winning the War on Cancer: The Epic Journey Towards a Natural Cure

Winning the War on Cancer
by Sylvie Beljanski
July 2021

Defining Moments of a Free Man from a Black Stream

Defining Moments of a Free Man from a Black Stream
by Dr Frank L Douglas
August 2021

If Life Stinks, Get Your Head Outta Your Buts

If Life Stinks, Get Your Head Outta Your Buts
by Mark L. Wdowiak
September 2021

The Preppers Medical Handbook

The Preppers Medical Handbook
by Dr. William W Forgey M.D.
October 2021

Natural Relief for Anxiety and Stress: A Practical Guide

Natural Relief for Anxiety and Stress
by Dr. Gustavo Kinrys, MD
November 2021

Dream For Peace: An Ambassador Memoir

Dream For Peace
by Dr. Ghoulem Berrah
December 2021