This way began as personal, with roots experience, imagination, reason, and in world CULTURAL [AM2] PARADIGMS of cosmos, life ways, aims, reason, and value. SECULAR sources are experience and reason so far. Often felt near complete, secularism is consistent with very different ROBUST other worlds, natural laws, and REASON. TRANSSECULARISM, metaphysical-rational and religious-emotive, tends to limited imagination or mythic literalism. The paradigms deny a potential vast unknown or see it via dogma. Potent but distorted, they move and limit civilization through time.

Why metaphysics, being …

What is metaphysics? (a) Knowledge of Being, (b) Knowledge of the Universe

1. Because of the substance issue, 2. because of the cycle of ideas and interactions building up a whole >> parts

Primal

To transcend such limits, we uncover uncritical universalization of modes of criticism and so free imagination from paradigmatic blindness. This reveals and enables proof of deep truth. The Ideas, p19, justify METAPHYSICS as knowledge of the real: they prove a radical, visionary, universal metaphysics—envelope of all truth, ultimate in showing the universe to have local but no essential limitation, that shows ideas as essentially incomplete without action, and that is deployed toward a way of realization of the ultimate in The Way, p48. Its perfection is conceived and shown, p33. It critically incorporates and goes beyond the paradigms and their PRIMAL sources. Grounded in experience, it is a mesh of the local and the ultimate. Seeming conflict with experience and paradigm is resolved by attention to meaning and proof. Re-education of intuition, required by the radical metaphysics, requires patience to see the matrix of ideas as a whole.

The essay is ongoing dialog among ideas, the real, and our place within it. Its world picture is a matrix of known and new ideas chosen as comprehensive of the real in terms of being, universe, experience, and difference. I provide design essentials for discovery and realization. Blue font text may be omitted at first reading. Resources, p60, amplify and consolidate material, and suggest research programs, sources, and resources.

Encouragement to freedom, imagination, reason, and action

The essay is dedicated to freedom in IMAGINATION, reason and action toward to realization for individuals and the world.

Narrative flow

Ideas flow from general-abstract to particular-concrete … from absolute neutrality to commitment … from the inclusive to the local

Every stage derives from earlier ones

The cosmology moves from abstract to particular, admitting neutral notions of mind-matter and derives rather than posits notions of identity, spacetime-relation

…which all lead to a mechanics of the real and realization to be used in the way

This section explains the narrative flow of The Way.

The ideas flow from general-abstract to particular-concrete. Every stage derives from earlier ones. After a foundation in a critical and complete account of meaning, the ideas begin with Being and universe as given and so neutral to kind and content as to accommodate a range from empty to greatest possible universes. The metaphysics shows the universe as greatest—inclusive of but far greater than our empirical cosmos and natural science. Similarly, a maximally inclusive cosmology moves from abstract to particular while admitting neutral notions of mind and matter. Identity, spacetime, and relation are derived rather than posited. The final section in the ideas derives a mechanics of realization to be used in The Way.

The way uses the ideas ® aim, ethic, path and way ® everyday and universal process templates ® epilogue: the path so far and its evaluation

The way deploys the ideas to set up the aim, attitude, imperative (ethic), and nature of paths—immediate to ultimate. These set up interwoven and adaptable everyday (immediate) and universal (ultimate) process templates. An evaluation of the path so far precedes presentation of the templates.

Ideas

Realizations of individuals, civilizations, and the universe have no limit. The immediate and the ultimate are interwoven. While in limited form realization is ever in process. The ideas are completed only in entering The Way, p48.

Truth, correspondence

With TRUTH as CORRESPONDENCE, the perfect primitive object is difference. The pragmatic primitives are ordinary language [AM3] and the cultural paradigms—used so that pragmatic correspondence imperfection is not inherited as essential.

Meaning

Referential meaning

Concept, object

Referential linguistic meaning

Signs, pure, compound (meaning from structure)

Possibility, clarity, adequacy, and definiteness of meaning; neglect results in confusions of meaning, wasted debate, unwarranted concreteness of meaning, and paradox

Pivoting definition of logic, resolution of semantic and logical paradoxes

As relational, truth requires REFERENTIAL MEANING to include a CONCEPT (any mental content) and its OBJECTS (note that while concept-object separation is crucial to analysis, the join is important in intuition). Referential LINGUISTIC MEANING associates signs with concept-objects; pure signs have no intrinsic meaning; structure contributes to compound sign meaning. This concept of meaning is essential to its possibility, clarity, adequacy, and definiteness. It is crucial later in defining Logic; its neglect results in many semantic and logical paradoxes. Online resources, p61, supplement this discussion.

Being

‘Being’ sets up fundamental ideas, especially Being, universe, and possibility, chosen to found the universal metaphysics, p26. The significance (1) Of Being is neutrality: inclusion of all existing things—this avoids errors of ill defined kinds, e.g. mind and matter. The issue of what has Being is not imposed: it falls out of analysis; this introduces algebraic power to thought; (2) Of universe is that, unlike the empirical universe it is definite: whatever has Being is in it; there is no other Platonic world. Are matter and numbers real? If and only if they have Being—are in the universe; (3) Of possibility is enablement of in-process-reflexive reason—and, so, clear conceptions of logic and science and clear definition of their ranges of application.

Metaphysics (here too?)

Being

Difference

All – Universe

Part including whole – A being

Being, existence – what is common to all beings

Beings have being!

Absence, empty part, nothingness, null being– The Void

Does the void exist? We don’t know yet but if so then the void has being and we redefine part as true part or whole or nothingness.

Knowing – relation – inseparable from being; knowing is (has) being

The UNIVERSE is the whole world over all DIFFERENCE and its absence. There is exactly one universe.

The use of ‘is’ above, is an example of a need for language that allows but does not force fine to coarse categories [AM4] .

A BEING (object) is the universe or part of it (not necessarily concrete, causal, spatiotemporal, or connected), ascertained by difference only [AM5] and finally [AM6] in knowing. No being is outside the universe—all are in it. A collection of beings is a being.

BEING (capitalized) is the property common to all beings. There is Being. Beings are not Being but have Being—they EXIST. The universe—all Being, all creation—is, itself, neither created nor caused; it lies outside meanings of ‘creation’ and ‘cause’. This beginning and allied ideas found the metaphysics.

The VOID is the null being or absence of Being. It is not clear from this definition whether the void exists.

Power, the ability to affect – ascertains being absent direct knowledge

Potential being, MANIFEST being

POWER, the ability to affect, may ascertain Being, absent direct knowledge. Thus even unsubstantial POTENTIAL is later seen to have Being; and NONBEING, as potential of an earlier being to REMANIFEST, has Being. Not all Being is some-thing.

State, possibility, constitution, limits and impossibility

Possibility – logical, universal, patterns and natural laws and readings, and natural and physical possibility, cosmological possibility, sentient and non-sentient possibility

For a being, a STATE is POSSIBLE if the concept, p21, of the state, simple or compound, does not violate the CONSTITUTION (difference from other beings) of the being (this is not a reference to possible worlds metaphysics). ACTUAL states are possible. Possibility is LOGICAL (of logos, word, or concept) when the only constraints on obtaining inhere in the concept. Logical impossibility is not a limit on the world. REAL possibility, over and above the logical, is marked by constraints inhering in beings. Logical possibility is the most LIBERAL—a state cannot be real but not logical. UNIVERSAL possibility has the universe as the being. Some beings or domains are marked by NATURAL LAWS (e.g., of our cosmos), which, so far as true, are true LIMITS or constraints and define NATURAL (e.g., PHYSICAL) possibility. As PATTERNS, natural laws have Being. We later distinguish SENTIENT vs. NON-SENTIENT possibility.

Logical Ê universal Ê natural Ê physical

Expect logical ÉÉ universal; universal É natural but perhaps natural = physical

Let ‘>’, ‘³’, and ‘>>’ be ‘includes’, ‘includes or is the same’, ‘includes far more than’. For a being possibility ³ actuality. The following inclusions for possibility obtain: the logical ³ universal ³ natural ³ physical. We normally expect that the first inclusion is ‘>>’ and all but the last are ‘>’. What actually holds? We now turn attention to this question.

Metaphysics and realism

Ground of metaphysics É tradition and personal knowledge, experience, reason — allows Ideal and pragmatic in relation with dual criteria

The ultimate character of the universe as realization of all possibility is shown just below. All possibility entails self-grounding. This keys perfect metaphysics with pure and

pragmatic sides. The pure stems from being; the pragmatic also from valid TRADITION (valid in all culture and civilization over time). This enables resolution of the essential problems of metaphysics, p61, and unification the modes of being and knowing, especially individual and universal identity.

Fundamental principle and its proof

If the universe is non manifest (void), there are no laws. Therefore, every logically possible state must emerge from that void state for the contrary would be a law.

But the void is present with all beings (a being and the void are just the being). So the universe is the realization of all logical possibility, i.e. it is limitless, for the universal actual is identical to logical possibility (this will be further clarified below). This is the FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLE OF METAPHYSICS, fundamental principle, or FP. It is the pivotal result of the ideas. This section now explores its metaphysical consequences.

(Metaphysical) consequences of FP

Existence of the void—there is at least one void; the number of voids has no significance; therefore we may take it that there is exactly one void

Power of the void (and equivalently of every state of being including the Universe)

Ultimate character of the universe

Realization of all possibility entails self-grounding

Perfect metaphysics with pure and pragmatic sides (repeat of above)

Emergence from the void (a) shows the void to have power and so Being and (b) as explanation, is ultimate foundation. Except that there is one, the number of voids has no significance.

FP = identity of logical possible and universal actual

The normal begins as our local sense of the real; the normal is required by FP

Possibility and impossibility, necessity; practical possibility, impossibility and necessity

The cosmos is infinitesimal compared to the universe = logical

Except logical possibility, normal necessity = very probable, normal impossibility = very improbable

Local and normal conservation but universal non conservation of normal laws

FP is identity of the logically possible and the universal actual. It implies a NORMAL sense in which our cosmos and laws are as in tradition [AM7] and infinitesimal compared to the logical-universal. The meaning of ‘normal’ includes that, except logical NECESSITY, what we regard as necessary or impossible from regularities of the cosmos, are but locally very PROBABLE or very improbable. I.e., there is local ‘conservation’ but universal violation of normal laws.

The logical constraints inhere in and only in concepts; logic and fact = Logic; Logic disallows only violation of fact and strictly logical – conceptual constraint

UNIVERSAL METAPHYSICS = what Logic allows º FP

Traditional science = universalization of local law but Science = the local pattern: a law of nature is a fact on some domain

Logic É science and in this interpretation, both are inductive in discovery (particular ® general) but deductive in application (general ® particular)

Scientific possibility » natural possibility

Logic and logics

Let us explore logic. Known logics exemplify it, at least roughly. In LOGIC, constraints inhere in and only in concepts; seeing facts as constraints among percepts, include facts in logic and, to avoid confusion with logic, rename it LOGIC (capitalized). A law of nature is a fact on some domain; elect this view this over law as universal hypothesis—thus Logic includes science (and tradition). But this seems strange because we see logic as deductive, science as inductive. This resolves in that discovery is inductive for both and inference under both is deductive (sciences and logics remain distinct). Thus Logic disallows only violation of fact and conceptual constraint. Define the UNIVERSAL METAPHYSICS (also called the metaphysics) as what Logic allows (logics, cosmoses, their sciences—ours or other, robust or not, and more). Then FP and the metaphysics are equivalent. Here, then, we find the metaphysics as (1) Identity of universal actuality and Logical possibility, (2) In process, (3) A join of logic and science. In abstract objects, p35, the metaphysics is seen to include systems of mathematics as abstract sciences.

The metaphysics is a REALISM that obtains in that the real is the object of what Logic permit

The pure and pragmatic both flow from tradition + experience + reason seen clearly; the real É reason and knowledge; and the pure and the pragmatic are dually perfect in relation to the (later) ultimate

The object of the metaphysics, so understood, is the universe—the real. I.e., the metaphysics is a REALISM that obtains in that the real is the object of what Logic permits. Let us flesh out the metaphysics or realism. A PURE part stemming from the notions of beings and possibility, pure metaphysics, shows the limitlessness of the universe; and, since its primitive founding objects are known precisely, it allows perfect faithfulness as its EPISTEMIC criterion. Valid pragmatic traditions including science—as validated cumulative experience—are locally and approximately faithful but this is all that is needed (or possible in so far as our form is limited); it is perfect from the point of view of adequacy and instrumentality in negotiation in and just beyond the normal. The pure and the pragmatic form a joint system: the pure will frame, clarify, extend, and be fleshed by the pragmatic; their criteria are PERFECTLY adapted: each to its ends and both jointly to the metaphysics and The Way.

Potency of the idea of Being

Perfection does not pertain to the world as a whole

Perfection of the foundation. Its source: perfect CATEGORIES—beings, universe, Being, void, possibility, and pragmatism (contrasts to the imperfect but useful classical categories)

There is potent metaphysics as knowledge of Being—its soured: The POTENCY of the idea of Being so far includes avoiding paradigmatic prejudice. As the pure and the PRAGMATIC, each on its criteria, are perfect, the FOUNDATION is perfect (this reflects an idea—perfection does not pertain to the world as whole). Contrary to a long tradition of post-enlightenment criticism, there is potent metaphysics as knowledge of Being. Its source: perfect CATEGORIES—beings, universe, Being, void, possibility, and pragmatism. This contrasts with the imperfect if useful categories of Kant and Schopenhauer.

It is clear that many significant results follow TRIVIALLY from FP. In what follows we do not give trivial PROOF—even when common paradigms and intuition are or seem violated.

The abstract and the concrete; resolution of their nature—and their identity; logical, mathematical and scientific realism on par

Death not absolute; existential significance; the ultimate a receptacle for disposition to emerging-merging-reemerging identity of substantial beings

The way of being, the aim of wholeness and real religion is discovery-realization of immediate-ultimate Being by limited beings using all elements of being and agency

FP resolves issues of the concrete and the abstract. FP: every Logical concept has an object. Consequences: no essential difference between CONCRETE and ABSTRACT objects or beings (abstraction omits concreteness, e.g. cause and space); Being is a being; realisms—Logical, MATHEMATICAL, and SCIENTIFIC—on par: from FP, mathematical systems are abstract sciences of forms which are real (and in Platonic worlds as parts of the one universe); all content—perhaps neither literal nor explicit, e.g. art—that has possible objects has real objects; DEATH is real but not absolute—a reminder that this life is no less significant than the ultimate and so to live well; the ultimate abstract is a RECEPTACLE of disposition to emerging-merging-reemerging identity of substantial beings; local science as locally valid but otherwise shed like snakeskin in transcending a cosmos; religions as allegorically real and socially significant but premature if taken literally; which suggests THE WAY OF BEING, the aim of wholeness, of real religion, as discovery-realization of immediate-ultimate Being by limited beings using all Elements of Being and agency, p48.

Cosmology

In cosmology we develop a picture of the universe. Metaphysics shows the nature of the picture, cosmology develops the picture at various levels of detail. General cosmology concerns the universe as a whole. The methods of cosmology are a continuation of the method of the metaphysics in which imagination and reason are applied to interaction of concepts from particular and general models and varieties of phenomena. This allows us (a) descriptions at a range of levels of generality (b) evaluation of the validity of the descriptions.

Cosmology develops a variety and range of Being preliminary to The Way, p48: elements include (a) reality (Being) of experience, (b) endless variety and peaks of Being, (c) weave of immediate and ultimate, (d) micro- vs. macro-increment, and (e) Elements of Being and agency, p48, and phases of growth.

The fundamental questions of metaphysics—Why is there being is resolved … What has being becomes the new fundamental question

Why is there Being at all? This fundamental question of metaphysics (Heidegger) is resolved. A new, appropriate, fundamental question is: What has Being—to what concepts do there correspond beings? All fundamental questions can be put in this form—identity, below, abstract objects, p35. Even the how of becoming has Being. A prime example of cultural distortion, p15: we argue GOD’s existence but the essential issue is What such ideals can mean!

General cosmology

Elementary patterns of difference and sameness ® identity ® spacetime as the modes of difference and relation ® universe as being over spacetime and its absence ® ® absence of spacetime « absence of identity ® immanence and locality of transparent identity ® mechanics of identity – relation – change ® epochs as temporary cosmoses

The most elementary pattern is DIFFERENCE across the universe’s oneness. IDENTITY is sense of SAMENESS of object or person. Difference with and without identity mark TIME (duration) and SPACE (extension), respectively, which would so be the modes of difference; then the universe is Being over all spacetime and its absence and perhaps other modes. Spacetime (difference) is IMMANENT in the world, not absolute, has and is of Being; relations among identities across extension mediate change over duration. Identity is transparent only when local: space-time-identity does not always separate into its components. Where identity is fully absent, so is spacetime. Process, relation, and state have being. An EPOCH is a realm of fact relative to which the rest of the universe is not determined.

Universe as field of Being; identities are its concentrations; experience as awareness; its modes—receptive, reflective, active; and fundamental extension as interior of relation—actual in the substance case and potential in the full case;

The universe is a field of Being and identities (entities, processes, relations—not substances) are its concentrations.

In knowing, p23, ‘experience’ is implicit; in power, p24, its scope is extended. A definition and extension are justified below.

Nature and modes of experience. The universal nature of experience-experienced as mind and matter.

In a first conception EXPERIENCE is subjective awareness in all its forms; related to sentience and consciousness, it is distinct from, e.g., cumulative experience. Introduction after FP avoids SUBSTANCE issues, p43, of ad hoc kinds as real and other equivocation. Its not entirely distinct modes are PERCEPTIVE (reception), REFLECTIVE (pure but potential real), and ACTIVE (agent). Seemingly ephemeral, experience is real, has Being; FP implies a fundamental extension, p43, et. seq., of experience, above, as interiors of relations—i.e., as essence and coextension of Being. It is an evident principle that experience-experienced (mind-body) should be studied each on its own terms and on mutually informing rather than reductive terms.

Agency, choice and free will. Agency and significance as aspects of experience. ‘Universe’ of significance and destiny as fields of experience and agency; sentient beings as their concentrations. Universe of significance and agency as effectively the highest.

The real world is known in and contains experience (solipsism and materialism are but alternate labelings). Experience—pure and engaged—is relationship, place of AGENCY which requires CHOICE (and, so, free will), and SIGNIFICANCE but experience is not all significance; subject-object meet in experience as one.

The ‘universes’ of significance and destiny are fields of experience and agency; and sentient agents (beings) are their concentrations. Assertions and reasoning for sentience follow; those for agency are similar. All peaks of form are accessible to sentient form. We might expect that all actuality >> sentient actuality; but from FP, for any form there is greater sentient form (and vice versa). The field of experience and agency has no limit; it is effectively and essentially the universe.

Pain, suffering, joy—their limits and cycles. Yoga and meditation approaches.

Only in sentience are there PAIN, SUFFERING and joy and agency; so in and only in sentience are there pain, its sometime temporal non-overcoming, its universal cycles of release and overcoming into JOY (bliss, calm abiding) and dissolution.

The Gita’s fourfold YOGA and MEDITATION-VISION QUEST are identity with the real—and identity of Being-process in the present as ultimate (this perhaps broader than traditional sense of practice includes science, philosophy, and their methods as special cases). As expansion of awareness, meditation is concurrent to discovery and realization of the real. It may begin as technique from a range of approaches. Shamata [AM8] , calm abiding, and vipasana, insight, Gates to Buddhist, Chagdud Tulku, are a good foundation. Beyul, nature pilgrimage to evoke true self, is told in Ian Baker: The Heart of the World.

Identity; its limitlessness, peaks, and cycles; causation; universal and local civilization; Brahman, Aeternitas, Buddhahood; no static ultimate

The universe has identity. Identity and manifestation have no limits—especially to variety, peak, extension, duration; cycle endlessly—without simple and universal periodicity—in acute, diffuse, and non-manifest phases in relatively remote epochs; universal CAUSATION is at most weak; causal connectivity is at most local (in creation-destruction, time has causal direction); beyond ours, there are cosmoses, natural laws, physical and living forms without end or limit; these occur meshed to a void-transient background; only some occurrences have mechanism; every atom is a cosmos, every cosmos an atom; individuals and civilizations inherit these powers—while in limited form realization is eternal endeavor; LOCAL CIVILIZATIONS (webs of cultures across time and continents) merge with UNIVERSAL CIVILIZATION (capitalized, the matrix of civilizations across the universe) and Being; discovery and realization beyond a cosmos—beyond the normal—is a limitless and [AM9] eternal journey. What is the identity of self? In overcoming limited form individuals realize the ultimate—BRAHMAN (Upanishad), AETERNITAS (Thomas Aquinas), or PERFECT BUDDHA. But for process even these are local peaks.

No substance; the normal case; the ultimate case and consistency with the normal; assessing the probable; transforming the improbable to the probable

General cosmology does not follow a strict substance metaphysics—i.e. one of fixed kinds and no emergence of or interaction among kinds. In monism, experience and Being are coupled through and through; in dualism their interaction is inexplicable. In general cosmology kinds and forms may occur independently but must at times merge, emerge, and export—kinds-forms are not substances and are organic to being. Our cosmos normally approximates monism. The constitution of beings is normal—only normally inviolable (see possibility, p25): beings have no absolute real limits or impossibilities.

If the metaphysics and cosmology read as fantasy—as if entering a strange land—their truth is cast in Logic. Where access is improbable, cosmology of form, next, seeks the probable. Then The Way, p48, seeks access to the ultimate (via intelligent commitment that enhances enjoyment and likelihood), transforming it as needed to the probable.

Cosmology and origins of form

Form, indeterminism, novelty, and determinism. Adaptive systems; adaptation as a kind of cause

The only universal way of origin of FORM is that of INDETERMINISM for NOVELTY and DETERMINISM for form. Evolution suggests a general incremental mechanism: indeterminist variation, then selection of adaptive states and a rough optimum step size: if larger, the probability of non viable organisms is high; if smaller, larger steps achieve more. From FP, such ADAPTIVE SYSTEMS origin is generic if not universal; details depend on context; it is causal in a general though uncommon sense; it can explain populations in the universe in terms of the product of frequency of origins and longevity or relative stability; it would explain the origin of form, cause, and laws for our cosmos. There may be other mechanisms but from FP, mechanism is not necessary—there are single step origins.

Singular events and their significance

Generally, function and form are in rough proportion; in a SINGULAR EVENT increase in function is far beyond such proportion. FP implies singular events—events at a threshold of function. Some factors are self-reference and micro-organization of macro-function. Such events partially explain origins of life from complex molecules; origins of human and linguistic intelligence; a hypothesized, perhaps imminent, immense leap in and dominance of computational and networking intelligence; and, from FP, conscious intelligence—with our being among its dispositions, p35—as driver and form of peaks of universal being. Singularity may be a norm in origin of essentially new forms and approaches to the universal.

Physical cosmology and its origins

Aim—to explain physical cosmologies from the space-time relational-experiential cosmology

The aim: show conceptual basis from general cosmology for an indeterminate space-time, relational-experiential cosmology.

Means—model the transient emergence of the above cosmology; symbolic-qualitative expression; quantitative approaches deriving from theoretical physics; computer modeling of void through deterministic layers whose dynamics is intrinsic rather than imposed

Origins. Vacuum transients arise in hierarchies of scale from the void. All possible worlds occur; an efficient mechanism is informed by modern cosmology—small near quantum transients combining as large scale near determinate-symmetric-stable hyper-dense state with some near classical behaviors. A DYNAMICS—change in semi-determinate relational identity, p38, depends on duration of interaction or ‘force’ across extension, and on inertia to change. Experience as relation, p43, et. seq. is an integral part of the dynamics. Essential issues: represent semi-determinate identity; whether this entails process indeterminism; account for dual origin of force-inertia [AM10] . Aim: improve-particularize-quantify. In realms of opaque measure and difficult analysis, e.g. beyond the empirical cosmos, simulation guided by cosmology may show a way: see online resources, p61, for a digital models [AM11] whose principle is layering from the void and random to mechanism.

Elements of Being and agency

The elements are hypothetical—the elementary components of be-ing, i.e. of agency and becoming, a basis of a mechanics or practical way of realization.

The hypotheses—(1) the elements as the dimensions of identity-relation-change model suggested by difference etc. p, (2) is one possibility, (3) will remain hypothetical to the degree not confirmed.

The ELEMENTS, tentative till shown perfect, of a way of Being and BECOMING are primitive basis of a mechanics of realization. In identity.(state)-relation-change models of MECHANICS, arising from ‘difference’, p38, the elements are of the DIMENSIONS [AM12] of identity (beings), RELATION (interaction: experience-communication, force-field…, and process.

Experience as relation with foresight is the essential element of relation (and includes fields). It ‘is’ all elements of mind, especially self-referential (examining) intelligence and commitment.

As relation with foresight, EXPERIENCE (includes knowledge, choice) mediates identity and process. A MECHANICS OF THE WAY OF BEING spells out means of realization. The mechanics is incremental in small or large steps (see Cosmology of form, p44): seeing-choosing-risking-acting and consolidating the significant and the ultimate. It is self-examining-referential, ever under discovery, an active part of the metaphysics. It employs-develops The Way, catalysts and ways; it is concerned with transformation of being and ideas. It has a core of interacting intelligent, feeling, and passionate COMMITMENT.

Dimensions of identity (often tied to place)—nature, individual, civilization, psyche, all local and universal

Some DIMENSIONS OF BEING (identity—‘beings’, often tied to PLACE) and PHASES of growth are the relatively primitive ground—NATURE, INDIVIDUAL; socio-cultural—LOCAL CIVILIZATION (its Being and instruments, e.g. discipline, practice, artifact, and technology); PSYCHE (experience—divided in rough metaphorical terms into heart as EMOTION and mind as COGNITION); and UNIVERSAL and ultimate Being and Civilization (peak and immersed-immediate-pure).

Elements of process are action and means; aspects are catalysts and ways—instrumental and immersive, discipline and practice, local and universal

PROCESS elements are action (motion), MEANS (ideas, choice); CATALYSTS and WAYS (fracturing-revealing vs. integrating-illuminating; traditional ways, e.g. religion, have catalysts such as sensory deprivation and one pointed meditation); intrinsic, cultural, and instrumental MODES (individual, civilization), DISCIPLINES and PRACTICES; and IMMERSION in LOCAL (and everyday) and UNIVERSAL PROCESS.

The Way

The Way, founded in the metaphysics, joins ideas and action practice which embeds the real in the psyche.

The Way is an approach to realization, founded in the Ideas, p19. It is a journal edited for general use. It joins the metaphysics with traditional and experimental practice to form a discipline for transformation. Once the ideas are absorbed, the task is to begin-renew the process. Ideas and action are an essential continuity—a contrast to our modern emphasis. In thought we conceive ultimate ends; in acting we engage with realization; continuity of idea and action embeds the real in the psyche.

Aim

The aim of Being is realization of the highest forms.

The AIM of The Way is now seen as a universal aim of Being: to know the range of significant Being and realize its highest immediate and ultimate forms for all beings and Civilization.

The ethic is to devote adequate energy of mind and heart to the aim

An ethic for the aim, implicit in the Introduction, p1, is this: given that intelligent commitment enhances realization and enjoyment, what energies should we devote to the aim? The oneness of the universe implies the worth of devoting resources to the aim as ‘duty’ and joy. Quantitative choice, individual and social, may recognize that resource allocation is already integral to our secular and transsecular institutions. ETHICS are driven by ‘heart’, p50, channeled by thought or ‘mind’, and encoded in culture. ‘Rational ethics’ stems from mind and heart—there is no ethics without reason, emotion, and value.

Attitude

An existential stance—doubt and positive action—to the ultimate nature of individual-universe is the ethical attitude

We should DOUBT universal metaphysics. However, it is internally consistent and consistent with all we know and can know. Its argument is at least highly plausible, e.g. from the proof itself; and as a form of OCKHAM’S PRINCIPLE it is minimal regarding what is not in the universe.

We therefore adopt universal metaphysics as an EXISTENTIAL ATTITUDE—valuable in itself and as affording the greatest likely immediate and ultimate outcome of life. Without intuition immersed in attitude, intellect is impotent.

We live in two worlds the finite with death and the limitless with immortality

While accepting temporal limits this side of death—while living in this world—we also live in act toward the ultimate.

Path

Being is ever on the path but engagement is the way to the greatest significance. The path begins with the greatest cultivation of the present occasion.

Being is ever on the path, sometimes consciously, to design and affect DESTINY. Individuals and civilizations peak at stages of ultimate realization; in death and decay they dissolve into and transact with the receptacle of eternal Being. The greatest cultivation of the present occasion of Being is essential: in the singular case, this life as the only life, it is the occasion; in the eternal case, the alternative is as if condemned to eternal death.

The everyday and universal process templates emphasize the immediate and the ultimate and that these phases must be connected

Everyday process, p55, is a personal, flexible, adaptable routine for living in the immediate as ultimate. Universal process, p57, is an adaptable process for living in the immediate for and with openness to the ultimate. An approach is to select from these templates; they are adaptable to a range of situations and phases of life and civilization—and deploy the mechanics, p21. RENEWAL, critical to practice, is reflected in the templates.

It is crucial that the everyday and the universal reflect each other and both reflect the immediate and the ultimate.

The path of Being so far

The path so far reveals the essential incompleteness of ideas—even though the ideas are mature, realization is always at a beginning

An evaluation of The Way of Being—the ideas are relatively complete but always under review. The ultimate is given to all Being but normally only felt, seen, or potential in ‘this life’—transformation is ongoing.

Everyday process

This brief template is adaptable to a range of ways and phases of life. It requires complement by a practice. Dedication through meditation are not mere events but infuse life.

Rise before the sun. Dedication (W Wilson). I dedicate my life to The Way of Being—to shared discovery and realization; to shed the bonds of limited self and so to see the way so clearly that even in difficulty life is flow over force; to realizing the ultimate in here and beyond. Shared affirmation (A Gupta). The pure unlimited consciousness that is all Being alone is supreme reality. That is the universe—its life and breath—that am I. So I am and embody the self-transcending universe that is all Being and has no other.

Review and meditate on realization and immediate priorities and means.

Everyday process template—1/2

EVERYDAY PROCESS-CONTINUED

3.	Realization. Work and care. Ideas, writing, networking with the young and the established; shared action, transmission, experiment: Everyday and Universal process, p57. Days for renewal. Other activities, e.g. languages, art.
4.	Tasks. Daily (AM); select / regular days for long term tasks.
5.	Yoga, p41. General, postural. Meditation, p41. Focus on spaciousness, freeing from ego-fixation, ultimate in-itself-and-the-present, continuity of meditation-action-Being.
6.	Exercise. Aerobic: in nature; and photography.
7.	Evening. Rest, renewal, realization, and community. Evening tasks, preparation and dedication of the next day and the future. Sleep early.

Everyday process template—2/2

Universal process

The actions and dimensions of Being in this template are sufficiently complete. The details show a program of my design; here they are illustrative and suggestive.

Action

Dimension

Details

Being

Pure Being and a spiritual home

Everyday process, p55, bridges the immediate-ultimate. Vision retreat.

Ideas

Knowing

For understanding, begin with the Ideas, p19.

For further design information see the Resources, p60.

Universal process template—1/2

UNIVERSAL PROCESS-CONTINUED

Action	Dimension	Details (for topics below, see online resources, p61)
Becoming with phases of human life	Nature, p50	Ground of real and renewal e.g. as in Beyul (Tibetan Buddhism).
	Civilization, p43, with society and culture	Civilization, shared immersion, community, populating the universe, cultural economics, politics, and ethics.
	Artifact	Artifactual Being and technology.
	Universal	Catalysts, ways, in everyday process, and renewal, knowledge, technology, developed-deployed in transforming Being-civilization.

Universal process template—2/2

Resources and resource development

Resources, essential to discovery and realization, are cultivated by accumulation, imagination, criticism, and excision.

Resource emphases are dimensions of Being, p49, particularly breadth and depth of experience, ideas, knowledge, and practice—all studied reflexively for method, too, has Being.

Topics emphasize breadth and depth and include: metaphysics, philosophy and narrative mode; design and planning; science and sciences, abstract and concrete; ethics; catalysts and ways; civilization; and art and artifact—see Topics for study. Sources include Plato, Adi Samkara (the Vedanta), Descartes, Hume, Kant, Charles Darwin, Karl Popper, Kurt Gödel, and a range thinkers and doers in natural science, cosmology, and religion.

Online—the resource section of http://www.horizons-2000.org/theway.html has useful links. The Way of Being site; A longer version of The Way; The Way: sources and details; Ground of the real; Beyul: Quest for the Real; Civilization; Shared immersion; Cultural economics-politics-ethics; Artifactual Being; Catalysts; Ways; Study topics. Older versions of The Way have sources and glossary. The following have plans Study topics, Modifications. Highlights is an overview. Finally, here is: a digital model of the early universe.

Universal metaphysics as resource. Introduction Resolution of the essential problems of metaphysics. 1 Nature, possibility, and development of a full and robust metaphysics. 2 Universal metaphysics as absolute-ultimate framework for knowledge, philosophy, science, mathematics, art, and destiny. It enables a potent attitude to doubt. 3 Perfect DUAL epistemology for pure-pragmatic metaphysics (imperfect by traditional criteria, the pragmatic, with science, is perfect in its function in the dual scheme). 4 Necessity, power and robustness of Frege’s concept of meaning. 5 The nature of Being; the universe as the greatest possible. Resolution of fundamental problems—Human Identity and Source of Being. 6 Cosmology—transient origin of stable cosmoses from the void. Indeterminism as essential in itself and to equilibrium between form-change and mechanism-chance. Foundation of creative-critical thought and measured freedom of will. The nature of object identity. Implication for the interwoven nature of space-time-matter and dynamics of change. Spacetime is the only measure of difference. 7 Being (void), not substance, as absolute foundation. Nature of matter-mind as being-relation in near substance cosmology; necessary general realization of this; therefore there is no categorial mind-body issue; so mind is organic and from adaptation, intense feeling arises with cognitive freedom. The variety of forms of mind-matter is unlimited but there are no further attributes. 8 The entire rational system of concepts has an object. This entails dual reconceptualization of logic and science. There is no essential distinction between concrete and abstract objects—the abstract are real and in the one universe; there is no other Platonic universe; and insofar as the abstract are acausal, atemporal, and non-spatial, it is because those features omitted in abstraction. The concrete-abstract distinction is not real but lies in the main mode in which they are known. The concrete are empirical; the abstract are known conceptually, in symbolic, often axiomatic terms; and from this greater simplicity, are known with greater definition and certainty. Natural laws have being; the void has no laws. 9 The metaphysics shows and provides an instrument for the highest realization. 10 Treatment of all essential metaphysics begins (began) with the simplest cognition—difference. We then saw measure of difference as spacetime and no more. Modes of being are experience-experienced; no more. Kinds of knowing are concrete-abstract; no more. Modes of instrumentality, perfect and pragmatic and no more, are sufficient to ultimate realization. The realm of the will-be-accessed-by-identity is the limitless infinitesimal to the limitless ultimate; no less.

Index

The index is in the full print edition.

Comments

[AM1]This first statement of aim should be a personal inclination. The statement in the second part on The Way should be the derived, demonstrated, and universal version.

[AM2]A study of culture and “civilization” is an excellent way to begin. Culture fills a void that seems to be equivalent to all reality but is in fact far less—and this deficit is often suppressed or even not noticed.

Also—one end or target of the way is civilization itself… and its individuals.

[AM3]As it arises reflexively in and as pertinent to its present contexts of use.

[AM4] I plan to develop such language. Categories to consider include tense, place, number, first – second – and third person, gender, permanence and impermanence, and distinction itself. Also to consider: the linguistic forms such as the subject-predicate form; and lesser logically arbitrary sentence forms. This could be considered from the points of view of general needs, metaphysics, science, general prose, and poetry. And from the points of view of descriptive, prescriptive, logical, and psychological grammar. The range of languages may provide examples and ideas.

[AM5] Knowing is necessary.

[AM6] If a being is possible that never enters or affects experience at all, even indirectly, it need not count as a being. This is not saying that a being is always in experience but it does suggest and it is later confirmed that beings are always in relation and that relation always entails or is experience in a generalized sense. This is certainly not saying that experience is the creation of the being. It will, however, be found that being and the generalized sense of experience are coeval and coextensive.

[AM7]This includes individuals and ideas.

[AM8]I omit Shamatha as in Pema Chödrön, How to Meditate, to conserve space.

[AM9]A repetition.

[AM10]See https://www.quora.com/Why-does-gravity-affect-all-forms-of-matter/answer/Anil-Mitra-2

[AM11]See ..\EarlyUniverse

[AM12]

1. Make the use of the word ‘dimensions’ consistent here?

2. Is the use of the word ‘dimensions’ here—apart from concerns of consistency’ adequate to my intent?