Philosophy 101

PHILOSOPHY 101

Chapter - 3

Reality - 2

OK!  I'll put the first things in the box.  Remember we're putting everything that's real in a box.  A box of reality.  All the real stuff there is.  I'll start with a list and you can tell me if I've forgotten anything.
Matter, Pogo sticks, Waffles, Concepts of God, Mind, Athiesm, Ideas, Love, Christianity, Unicorns, Islam, Atoms, Gremlins, Agnosticism, Hate, Quarks, Bosons, Time, Emotions, Words, Definitions, Evolution, Cause, Effect, Universes, Life, Galaxies, Death, Big Bang Theory, Yellow Brick Roads, Magic, Past, Present, Anniversary Presents, Birthday Presents, Future, Concepts, Numbers, Mathematics, Infinity, God, Truth, Probability, Falsity, Possibility, Dimensions.
Have I forgotten anything?  I'm sure you can think of many other things to add.  I've included many categories - if you think of something that can just be added to a category, don't bother to add it separately.  Oh I do want to add facetiousness, ( that's one of the nice textural words I like so much).  I'm sure many of the things in the box will be disagreeable to many of you.  Probably all of you will say wait!, wait! - lots of this 'stuff' isn't real.  I say all stuff is real or it isn't stuff at all!  Remember, I said we were putting everything in the box that is real in ANY WAY!  If we are sitting here talking about things or 'stuff' that isn't real then what are we really talking about?  I don't think that many people are going to say that ideas don't exist.  Even if you can't touch them you wouldn't be thinking about them if they were not IN SOME WAY REAL.  I hope to show you, eventually, that everything is - ultimately - real in the same way.  An infinity of 'Cogito Ergo Sum...'  I am through arguing with you now.  If anyone thinks there is something that doesn't belong in the box they can email me their disagreements.  I define reality as everything.  To me - if you are arguing that something is not real, you are PROVING to me that it IS real!

OK! - Now - Is everything in the box?  What might be outside the box?  God?  Nope!  If you are a believer then you think God is real so he, she, it, is in the box.  If you are an atheist you apparently believe there is a concept of God, (and the word God), so it's in the box.  OK. So I guess nothing is outside the box. Wrong again!  There really is a concept of nothingness, which is already in the box.  There isn't nothin' outside the box!!  Gee-Whiz, I guess we didnt need a box.  Reality is already in it's own box.  Reality can't help but define itself.
Think about that for a while.  Try to come up with something to think about that you can say does not in some way exist.
Now my brain is sore. I'm going to take a break. But, there is a lot more to come.  Have you ever thought about what things are made of?  Like little boys and little girls - snipes and snails and puppy-dogs and ginger and black pepper and other stuff, in intricate interrelationships, to make minds and personalities and 'stuff'.  Is a snail made out of the same stuff as a personality?
I'll be back!

Teaching Method

You can't call my method of teaching 'Brain Washing'. I know that before anyone can really 'know' or understand anything of value, they must be able to hold as much as possible in their brain at the same time.  Those things which they and others believe are real and true - what they and others believe is unreal and false.  Reality is known, understood, conceived, created - when all paradoxical, true, false real information is processed, synthesised, interrelated,collated, reconciled.  To wash anything out before I start adding new things would be counterproductive.
Repitition, repitition!
Repeat the above - Repeat the below.
Remember it this way and that.
If you really think it's true you better think again.
Make sure you can prove it false.
But realize that's an error.
Then you'll know it's real.



.

Communication - 2

The way we use language says a lot about our metaphysical beliefs.  The way mind uses the tools of mind says everything there is to say about metaphysics in general.  If language is not the only tool of mind, I think it is generally acepted that language is needed to move all of the gems and detritus, which is mined by these other tools, from one mind to another.  An ongoing arguement, between my mind and other minds is whether or not language is necessary to create, discover, compose, decompose, synthesize, ( etc....the lexicon, which to my mind, is seen as synonomous), information within an individual mind.  I maintain that there are other tools, more important to the individual mind, which are inately such that they cannot be communicated because language is the tool of communication.  I've tried to describe these mind tools with words such as 'a priori knowledge', 'intuition', 'poetry', 'myth', and 'emotion'.  All of these require words, which obviously can't convey the full meaning which I see behind the words, and some, like poetry, have words as part of the tool but provide 'wordless' information.

It appears that information is being transferred from mind to mind, but how much of that information is being misinterpreted because of the inability of language to communicate it accurately?  Too often I am amazed when I carefully explain something to someone and they seem to interpret my language as having meaning much different from what it has to me.  Possibly if one mind 'listened' to another mind, then took that information and deciphered the metaphysical world view, the reality view of that mind, a greater understanding could be achieved.  'Literature' does that better than anything I have found.  But ya gotta read between the words.