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For a given version, there will be a main or highest level c-statement; main statements for other versions may be among the c-statements

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A TREATEMENT OF BEING AND METAPHYSICS

BEGUN AS A SHORT VERSION OF ‘JOURNEY IN BEING’

File Created JUNE 28, 2012

Latest Edition July 11, 2012

ANIL MITRA

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The modes of mind are determined by the circumstance of being in the world or Universe: binding to world and self—perception and feeling, freedom—conception, commitment of feeling, reflection—even hallucination and illusion, knowing, choice, intention, execution; and their now separate now together characters

The Concept and concepts. Referential Concepts

A Concept is a mental content; a concept is a container of sense; all concepts are Concepts. A referential Concept is one that may refer, refers, or is intended to refer to an Object; the Concepts themselves are Objects

Here primary interest is in referential concepts, so we normally drop the qualifier ‘referential’(we can discuss non-referential Concepts as Objects)

Objects. Existence

An Object is the world (Universe) or something in it. There is nothing outside the Universe. A referential Concept refers or it does not; if it does the sign of the Concept, X, may also name or designate the Object and we say ‘X Exists’; if reference is empty, X designates no Object and we say ‘X does not Exist’

There are Existing Objects for if there were not, you would not be reading these words or even having an illusion of reading

On Logic and Reference

The least restrictive requirement for a Concept to refer is that it satisfy Logic. I.e. things, processes, interactions, properties, and abstracta including even values, and intuitive and reasoned and ad hoc combinations of these may refer to Objects and if they do so, the Objects are in the Universe. According to the Universal Metaphysics to be developed, while there are Logical Concepts that do not define Objects in our world, every Logical Concept has reference in the Universe: i.e. Logic is necessary and sufficient for reference

‘Practical’ Objects are definite by projection and the Concept is a construct rather than a thing; we might refer to this construct at the intersection of world and knowing as the Object; however we need not for ‘good enough’ is good enough (precision and clarification on this later). There are, however, perfect Objects

Signs and Icons

Concepts are complexes of signs and icons; icons are necessary for sense and reference; abstract signs refer only by associating with icons; signs enable efficiency in representation, recording, thought, expression, and communication; signs become iconic by compounding (e.g., in sentences). Signs and icons lie on an abstract-iconic continuum

Signs, associations, and rules as icons are sources of the efficiency but indeterminate character of language (which becomes more determinate in context). Language has all the efficiencies noted above; and its meaning comes from its intrinsic (structural and conventional) and associative iconic character which is also a source of sometime incompleteness and illusory concreteness

Meaning

Meaning inheres in a Concept that intend to refer to Object(s); and the Objects so referred

Meaning is not always perfect; perfection in meaning requires some simple Objects to be unitary by abstraction or atomic character and this permits meaning or logical atomism; we will see powerful examples of abstraction where meaning and validity of reference will lie primarily in the complex (system) which in turn justifies individual use but does not exclude other uses except that confusion should be avoided. In general referential perfection does not obtain but ‘good enough’ and Valuational senses of meaning may do so

Analysis of Meaning

The analysis of the meaning of ‘X does not Exist’, above, is a first example of the power of analysis of meaning. It preemptively resolves the paradox of the non-existent Object, i.e. if unicorns—for example—do not Exist then to what does the word ‘unicorn’ refer

Note that meaning already incorporates adaptation and Experience and therefore analysis of meaning has an Experiential and empirical component; analysis of meaning is not mere analysis

Analysis of the Conceptual-Linguistic Meaning of Being and of Linguistic Meaning

Consider the Concept ‘tiger’; a tiger is not a lion; we think of a tiger as an entity but it is also a process and a system of interactions; but a tiger is not a pure process or a system of pure interactions

Generally, concreta such as tigers and bricks, make distinctions as to entity, process, interaction, property (often considered abstract, a property has also concreteness or particularity). However a Concept need not make distinctions as to the aspects of concreteness

Consider a person in America talking about a tiger. He or she may say ‘The tiger is here now’ and ‘The tiger was in India two years ago and will be in Africa again in fifteen months from now’

The words here / there define distinctions as to place and is / was / will be define distinctions as to time

When I say ‘X exists’ I typically mean ‘X is somewhere now’ and ‘somewhere’ refers to some range of locations (possibly all) while ‘now’ to the present or a relatively small interval of time that includes ‘this instant’. However there appears to be no word in English that corresponds to ‘X exists, existed, or will exist’ (i.e. in some ranges of place and some intervals of time). We will use the words ‘Exist’ and ‘Is’ to include this sense, i.e. ‘X Exists’ and ‘X Is’ shall mean ‘X exists, existed, or will exist in some or all ranges of place and some or all intervals of time’

However, some Objects do not Exist in space or time. That may be because their ‘location’ in the Universe does not admit of clear Being or perception of space-time or because space-time is not the mode of Being of the Object. An example of an Object whose mode of Being is not space-time is number. Generally, abstract Objects contrast with concrete or particular Objects in a number of ways one of which is that the mode of Being of the abstract is not that of space-time or even generalized Extension-Duration

We extend the meaning of ‘Exists’ and ‘Is’ and ‘Being’ to not make the concrete-abstract or in-not in space-time distinction (later we find that, in contrast to most modern opinion, there is one Universe and all Objects are in it)

Being makes no distinction except in contrast to non-Being; though formally tautologous, the foregoing discussion make the meaning of the assertion clear

Since meaning is indeterminate with regard to convention, context, understanding (i.e. use) and, for Limited form, is open, we say ‘Meaning has Being’; and this points to the fact that ‘meaning is ever in question’ (except when it becomes some how determined), i.e. that when I say ‘What is a tiger?’ or ‘What is space?’ or ‘What is Being?’ I am also asking the questions such as What is the meaning of questions such as ‘What is Being?’

Experience

Here Experience is subjective content; as a Concept, Experience may be illusory

There is Experience, for even illusion is Experience

Experience names the fact of Experience; the fact is robust

Experience is the only Concept that may be and is its own Object in the sense that we have Experience of Experience, e.g. when I Experience the fragrance of a rose I know or Experience this Experience. Thus, far from its sometimes apparent unreality and non-objectivity, Experience is the most concrete of things

There are various sources of doubt regarding the fact and concreteness of Experience. These include subjectivity and materialism. The thought regarding subjectivity is that Experience is the place of subjectivity—this is mistakenly confused as the thought that the Being of Experience is subjective. The thought regarding materialism is that the Concept of matter makes no reference to Experience (or mind in general) therefore on our modern widespread paradigm of materialism, how can there be Experience—and how can Experience have causal efficacy? The mistake here is to suppose that since matter makes no reference to mind, therefore mind is not an aspect of matter… or that mind is present in matter but as an add on. That matter makes no direct reference to mind allows that mind is already an aspect of the material (as we know it andor as we shall discover it to be)

The next section addresses the objectivity and robustness of the content of Experience

Experience is significant as theater of our Being and connection to the world

Later, conceptual and perceptual Experience will be seen as revealing the richness of individual and world

Real World

The solipsist challenge to Realism ‘perhaps the entire world is your Experience and the fact that there is actually something outside your Experience is an illusion’

If this were true there would still be a ‘real world’ but that is not what I really mean by Real World. The Real World is the world that Exists independently of being known; it may be the Object of my Experience but it is not my Experience. It is sometimes referred to as the ‘external world’. I prefer ‘Real World’ because it is not truly external even to my mind or Experience. In ‘external world’, ‘external’ is used metaphorically

If we accept that there are vast tracts, even known tracts, outside the Experience of the ‘I’ then the solipsist position is either mistaken or merely a relabeling of the world and its Reality

The answer to the modern ‘brain-in-a-vat-stimulated-by-a-computer’ version of the solipsist argument has the following response—The brain-in-vat metaphysics is true: brain is brain and the Universe (which includes the brain) is the computer… and the brain-in-vat scenario is either relabeling of the standard account or is false (in future there may of course be concrete or simulated brains that are fed virtual universes by actual computers made of silicon etc. or carbon, e.g. as in our cosmos)

Thus the concept (i.e. content of Experience) and fact of the Real World are robust

It is of course not intended that every Experience refers to something. Later we will see that such reference is far greater than might be expected from the typical casual, experiential and philosophical stances—even where imagination is tempered by criticism

Being

Being is what is there, i.e. what Exists

Whatever has Being is an Object

What has Being, i.e. what has Objecthood? This problem is fundamental in importance

If there were no Being the reader would not have the Experience of reading these words, nor even the illusion of the same

There is Being

Introduction to Metaphysics

Metaphysics is Knowledge of Being as such

In ‘there is Being’ we have a demonstrated metaphysical Truth

The facts of Existence, Experience, Objects, and the Real World are also metaphysical Truths

This is a powerful counter to doubt regarding metaphysics

Thus far metaphysics is trivial; metaphysics of ultimate power (in some senses) will emerge later

Universe

The Universe is All Being

A Law is a Pattern;

Laws have Being

The Universe Exists and contains all Objects including Laws

The previous two statements are metaphysical truths

Possibility

Possibility is relative to a context. If a universe is defined as a collection of marbles then 10 red marbles are possible relative to that context as are three large and four small marbles. However, lions and tigers are not possible relative to that context

However, as All Being, the Universe has no other context. To be possible something must actually obtain (past, present, or future)

If something is actual it is obviously possible. Therefore:

For the Universe, possibility and actuality are identical

This is another metaphysical truth

Part

A part is something that has no portion not in the whole

The Universe is part of itself

This is a consequence of definition and not a metaphysical truth

Domain

A Domain is part of the Universe

The Universe is a Domain

The complement of a Domain is the entire Universe except the portions of the Universe in the Domain

The complement of a Domain is a Domain

A Domain and its complement taken together are the Universe

The complement of the complement of a Domain is the Domain

If there is a Domain it has a complement that Exists

Void

The Void is the complement of the Universe

The Void Exists; i.e. The Void contains no Being, no Object, no Law

Metaphysics

Principle of Being

If from the Void some state could not emerge that would be a Law of the Void. Therefore all states emerge

In other words the Universe has no Limit

It is important to be clear about the meaning of ‘Limit’

It does not refer simply to size. It means that there is no limit to the Extension, Duration, and Variety of Being in the Universe (cosmoses, Laws, beings without Limit against a transient, eternal, Void background). This includes that the Universe has Identity and its Being and Identity go into phases of acute and diffuse Identity and its Identity and Being go into phases of manifestation and non-manifestation; and that its Identity has continuity (soul) even across the non-manifest. It includes that individuals realize Universal Identity (and Power or Limitlessness) even though in limited form this realization is an endless process of summits and dissolutions

That the cosmos is a some state is not a Limit on the Universe. If the cosmos had to be in that state that would be a Limit. If the cosmos had to be forever unlimited in variety, Extension, Duration that would be a conceptual Limit

The Principle of Being, PB, is the assertion The Universe has no Limits

Universal Metaphysics

This is the metaphysics that follows from the Principle of Being (PB)

Since the Universe is (trivially) unique, so is the Universal Metaphysics as knowledge of the Universe (obviously it can vary in detail and mode of expression)

Existence of the Void and origin of every state directly or indirectly from the Void (or any other state) is a non-relative foundation without substance. The Universal Metaphysics is ultimate in depth

‘Origin of every state’ is implicit representation of variety. The metaphysics is ultimate in variety or breadth

Further it shows the Universe itself to be ultimate

On Method: Doubt and Attitude

The Efficacy and Functions of Doubt

We considered whether Experience named anything and found that it does

Doubt as Dual of Certainty

Doubt led to certainty; this is one function of doubt; doubt is dual to certainty; needing certainty occasions doubt and doubt may establish certainty or degrees thereof

Doubt in Clarification of Meaning

In doubting Experience, the meaning of Experience was clarified

Doubt led to clarification of meaning

…and Therefore in Understanding the World

We have identified two related functions of doubt (Descartes emphasized its importance)

Doubt as a Source of Method and its Coeval Character and Emergence With Content

Doubt further leads to method and to seeing that method and content are coeval and emerge together

…the Example of the analysis of Experience

We found that abstraction ‘Experience’ rather than kind of Experience, ‘Being’ as nothing more than Existence, leads (in some cases) to perfect knowledge; we also saw the effectiveness of naming the given (Being is what is there); and analysis of meaning (e.g. looking into the meaning of Experience, effective meanings of Universe, Law and so on) are tools of discovery (in this case of perfect knowing) and we can now see that this is not mere wordplay because meaning already incorporates the empirical (via experience)

Summary of Method So Far

Method. Note an essential method of this knowledge, established implicitly in Ch. Being, is analysis of meaning which already contains the empirical (Experience), abstraction that leaves out distortable detail, and naming the resulting given

This Method So Far is an Abstract of All Method

This extends to the following development of the metaphysics, Logic, and treatment of the Object…

Universal Metaphysics

While the complement of a true sub-domain (obviously) Exists we argued that the complement of the Universe—the Void—also Exists

I have doubt about this. Doubt is important for metaphysical reasons (Does the Void Exist?) and especially because of the momentous conclusions drawn from Existence of the Void

It is hard to pinpoint the logical source of the doubt for the argument is not mere wordplay. For consider the following ‘proofs’

As absence of Being, Existence of the Void changes nothing; therefore Existence of the Void is effectively true (deductive)

Since Laws apply to what is there, they do not apply to nothingness; therefore even if the Void does not exist, there are no Laws in the nothingness outside and amid the Universe; though it does not prove Existence of the Void, this plausible argument allows the same momentous conclusions to be drawn; plausibility proof is not proof but it is helpful in assuaging intuitive doubt and as the source of deductive proof

Surely these arguments have some force

However, I have been unable to remove all doubt

Attitude

Along with the great advances in logic of the one hundred and fifty years it has been realized that, except where trivial, even logic is not entirely certain

And yet we live with the uncertainties of logic, mathematics and science because of the potential

The present case is similar

An interesting consideration is as follows. Suppose I knew that the Existence of the Void cannot be proven. Given that it appears reasonable and contradicts no logical principle or, as we will see, science what would I do? I would spend some time devoted to living out its consequences… even without any proof whatsoever. This would be to maximize expected outcome; and the fact of reasonable proof strengthens the argument

Then we might define Faith as that attitude that is productive of maximal outcomes. Obviously, Faith would be a mix of optimism, anticipation, application, and doubt (and would have nothing to do with belief in the absurd)

WORKING VERSION OF CENTRAL STATEMENTS

Anil Mitra

© COPYRIGHT June 25, 2012—July 2012,
ANIL MITRA, PHD

DOCUMENT CREATED JANUARY 6, 2012

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CONTENTS

Note that the content titles are now in the overall table of contents

Plans

Extract central statements

Formatting

Words that have a meaning specific here will be capitalized when there are other formal or common meanings—and the first use may be in small caps, e.g. IDEA: Idea, Being, Action <-- do this in the order of occurrence

The Human Endeavor

Ideas and Action

1. The elements of the human endeavor are ideas and action. This is different from mechanism or blind process in that action is guided by ideas (perceptions, conceptions, understanding, theories, emotions and motivations, foresight and so on)

‘Human Endeavor’ includes but is not limited to ‘high endeavor’, e.g. the endeavors of civilization. It includes the immediately practical and the day-to-day

The meaning of perfection and any ultimate meaning of good may depend on the nature of the entire Universe. Perhaps the metaphysics to be developed below has implications for perfection and ultimate good

Limits

2. We have aware of limits to the human endeavor. We often think of these limits as absolute. However we will see that most of what we think as absolute is contingent but so effectively part of our world as to often seem absolute (the meaning and truth of this will become clear below)

There are two fundamental attitudes to our ideas: the open and the prematurely closed. In the former it, except where shown otherwise our positions are not taken to be absolute or universal. In the history of science its theories have often been prematurely regarded as closed. After a century and more of revolutionary science, however, we still tend to regard our theories as closed: as defining the universe. However the very approach of science itself shows that its truth is not given to extend beyond the edges of the known universe. Where are these edges? Some are remotely distant in time and space. Others, however, are ever present at very small dimensions of space and intervals of time. These are limits to science today in that science makes no claim to knowledge beyond these limits and allows that the beyond is without Limit in extension, duration and variety. What we have just shown is a neutrality of science toward what lies beyond its current borders; this stands against a certain kind of positivism, often implicitly held, that would assert that scientific knowledge of the universe is complete. We often think of science as open and dogma and fundamentalist religion as closed. However, neither science nor religion is open or closed. It is our attitudes toward them that may be open or closed. In so far as our images of God are religious icons and in so far as we have not conceived all realistic notions of final power (which if science for example is to remain open we cannot have done) we can claim atheism but cannot claim it; the most that it is reasonable to claim concerns the limited iconic imagination of the actual religions

We also hold limits to action: there is only so much that we can do with our physical, psychic, and cultural forms. These limits, i.e. our ideas of them, are practical and experiential but without necessary demonstration. We do not leap off tall buildings; and we regard science as revealing at least some practical limits to the possibilities of civilization and culture. However, we have seen above definite doubts to the universality of science. Even while be pay practical homage to the limits of our experience it is truthful to maintain doubt and, I hold, of value to seek at least in some of our thoughts ways out of the bounds of what we think to be material necessity. We maintain some neutrality to the necessity of experience, i.e. of our interpretations of what we Experience

Journey in Being

The Idea of a Journey

3. The idea of a Journey in Being has its origin in three sources

The first source in order of occurrence is in the background to my life. My brother is quite different than I and so I suspect that nature (genetics and early development) are significant. Nurture includes my place and family of origin and my education. An essential element of this background is the cultural milieus, the tradition, in which I have lived (I use ‘tradition’ in an extended sense: it is the cumulative culture to which I have been exposed and that includes the modern science and reason). I have gained much in the way of knowledge, ideas, and paradigms of thought, action and experience from cumulative culture

The second source is my life itself. Perhaps the most important aspect of my personality in this context is multi-valence of interest and a passion to know and to live what I know. I could characterize the passion to know by saying that it is active, i.e. not absorbed only from books and education; I have tried out a variety of ways of understanding the universe (and its parts) including the scientific, philosophical, and experiential. If this process is remarkable it is perhaps because of commitment over many years. I came to see this process with its many forks, its continuous threads as well as dead ends, and experiments as a journey

The third source is a world view that I developed: outcome of the variety of ways of understanding. An essential reason that I did not commit to any of my earlier and experimental ideas is absence of proof. However, in 2002 I was able to demonstrate what I call the Universal Metaphysics which, since it is shown to be unique, can also be called the metaphysics.

What is metaphysics? Here, it is knowledge of things (Being) as they are. There is a tradition of denial of the possibility of metaphysics in this conception of it. However we will find it more than possible: we will demonstrate an immensely powerful metaphysics

The metaphysics agrees with science—especially modern physical cosmology—where it is valid but also shows the Universe to be of far greater extent, duration and variety revealed in science (demonstration and elaboration of the metaphysics follow). It is a consequence of the metaphysics that experience of the Universe for a finite human form must be not only in ideas but also in action and transformation. I.e., the action and transformation are not only a living out of but also a completion of the ideas: without action the ideas remain incomplete. The metaphysics is an articulated system of ideas; the ideas stand together and it is the meaning of the system that contains the power of the metaphysics. Among these ideas Being, Void and Universe stand out as fundamental. Being is fundamental in the neutrality of character that it has in the system. It is a powerful and effective container for the other ideas and for the story of an individual or a civilization. I began to think of the path that begins in ideas and continues in action and transformation as a Journey in Being. ‘Journey in Being’ became the container term for an entire system of ideas and action and, at a personal level, the process that led up to and originated in this system

The Ways of the Journey

4. At the broadest level, the ways are Ideas and Action (including transformation)

Experience

5. The first definition here of Experience is that it is subjective feeling

Related though not entirely identical ideas are awareness and consciousness. Examples are the feeling of the brilliance of sunset, the experience in having a memory or a sequence of thoughts or intentions (including the feeling of form of those thoughts), the feeling of emotion and emotional variety, pure Experience e.g. stream of consciousness…

While Experience is not everything for a human being, without it there might as well be nothing (later the meaning of Experience will be extended to include much more of what lies in the Universe). It is the place of significance; it is the theater of being human. Without Experience we might as well be mechanical robots or zombies without feeling or inner life

I choose Experience as preliminary to development of the metaphysics because it a connection to and breathes humanity and life into the formal (skeletal) metaphysics

Various doubts regarding Experience have been raised by thinkers. Some deny the human significance of Experience; this concern has already been addressed. Some deny that there is such a thing; some deny it any practical significance. Others hold that Experience has no object or that we cannot trust the objectivity of Experience. In the following we address these doubts

We think of Experience as subjective. However, part of Experience is that of Experience itself. One may object that that is illusion but an illusion is an Experience

Some thinkers object to Experience as a proper topic for study because ‘it is subjective’. However that Experience is subjective does not mean that its existence is in doubt; it means that when Experience seems to refer to an object the Experience may be illusory

There are philosophers who object to the assertion that the idea that there is Experience (this view has been called eliminativism). Similarly, other thinkers hold that Experience is real but has no causal significance (this view is epiphenomenalism). A primary source of these views is probably a commitment to materialism or physicalism: since material and physical terms make no reference to mind, materialism and the existence of mind appear to be contradictory. The eliminative solution is to deny mind. Epiphenomenalism is a compromise between eliminativism and the apparent reality of mind: mind has a lower grade of reality. However, depending how the epiphenomenalism is viewed it may be seen as having the ills of the strangeness of eliminativism as well as of the paradox of mind in a material view

However, I believe these anti-mental views are based on an error of thought. The absence of mental terms in the description of physical objects does not imply the non existence of mental ‘things’. And the existence of mental things does not imply the existence of non physical things; e.g., the effect of interaction or force in a particle could be physical and mental (and we will see that something similar must be the case). Imputing reality andor causation to Experience is not anti-material. There are other thinkers who hold that the presence of mind-like features at the elementary level is paradoxical because it posits little minds inhabiting the material elements (a) which is absurd in itself and (b) contradicts the dominant materialist view of the day. We have already seen that (b) is not true and, further, (a) there is no positing of ‘little minds’. What I have asserted is that the physical is not non-mental and the mental is not non-physical; and what is present at the elemental level is nothing like human mind any more than an electron is like a human being

Solipsism is a view that is rather the opposite of eliminativism. A solipsist is someone who holds that Experience is the only thing we certainly know and therefore holds that there is no Real World that is the object of Experience (or at least that one cannot prove the existence of such a world). A solipsist however will admit that it is ‘his’ or ‘her’ Experience that there is a sense of an ‘I’ whose extent of experience, knowledge is immensely limited in relation to that of ‘others’ and that there is a part of the ‘world’ called the ‘body’ that is experienced as under some control while the rest of the ‘world’ is not. Thus the solipsist position is essentially a renaming of the world and not a position that is distinct from Realism (in the sense that there is a world independent of our ideas). Incidentally this kind of argument defuses the ‘brain in a vat’ idea according to which my Experience could be that of a brain in a vat suitably hooked up to neural probes stimulated by a computer and that I have no way of distinguishing this case from the conventional case (that I am a person with a brain in a world that I Experience). The response is, yes I am a brain in a vat and the brain and vat and the computer are make up my body and the Universe. I.e. the solipsist and the brain-in-vat positions are not anti-Real but simply re-label the Realism that there is a Real world. Further, this world is robust in that our sense that certain parts of it (person) are under one kind and degree of control and the remainder is under another kind and degree of control. In what follows, we will see that metaphysical knowledge is far greater than we normally suppose possible for human knowledge. However, here we may make a practical argument. Our knowledge has net realism in the following way: we successfully if only partially succeed in negotiating complex psychic, social, and natural environments

We have shown that Experience exists. The ‘method’ is remarkable even though trivial: we saw that even though we doubt objectivity at times we cannot doubt Experience for Experience names what is given: it is a name for the (abstract) fact of our internal life of mind. Thus, if metaphysics is knowledge of things as they are we have definite and metaphysical knowledge of Experience. We have also shown that Experience is not the ineffectual thing sometimes commonly and or philosophically think it to be

We have further shown the metaphysical objectivity of Experience in showing us a real world and its practical and robust objectivity in revealing the contours of the world (even though it is typically projective and incomplete and occasionally illusory)

Doubt and Certainty

6. Above various doubts were raised about Experience. Experience is central in our lives and yet we entertained doubts that there is such a thing as Experience and that it has significance. In everyday life we have doubts because doubt is critical to overcoming uncertainty. However we have to live with some uncertainty; too much doubt can be neurotic; and doubt should not cripple us into inaction or ineffective leadership. However, doubt regarding Experience seems to have been taken rather far

There is a reason for this. In practical situations we tolerate uncertainty. Here, however we are beginning the foundation of (an attempt at) ‘universal metaphysics’. We want the highest certainty available because the metaphysics will only be directly practical, it aims at being a foundation for knowledge in general. Thus our demonstrations above, put Experience on a firm foundation

However, doubt and response to doubt have done more than root Experience. First, we have placed Experience on firm ground as an object of which we have perfect (metaphysical) knowledge. Second, we have identified two ‘methods’ in this process (1) Analysis of meaning, e.g. of Experience, ‘matter’, ‘mind’ and so on which analyses were crucial to the process (and in which we have seen that concepts already have encoded experience and therefore analysis of meaning is not limited to concept clarification but also empirical) and (2) Abstraction and (3) Naming of what is given

In summary, doubt leads to certainty appropriate to the situation, to clarification of meaning, and to methods of demonstration (in metaphysics… and a similar picture obtains in science)

We use a similar approach below to Being and Universe. This basic level of metaphysical knowledge will be perfect

Once we get into truly powerful and interesting development (demonstration of the Universal Metaphysics) we will encounter doubt that has not been eliminated. It seems that a similar situation exists in all human endeavor. We will attempt to characterize the un-eliminate doubt and develop appropriate attitudes toward it

Being, Universe, and Void

7. Being is that which Exists or has Existence. (There are other notions of Being; this is the one used here. The ideas Being and Existence are associated with various problems that are addressed in the main development). The Universe is All Being. A Domain is a region whose every element is in the Universe (the Universe is a Domain). The complement of a Domain is the region that together with the Domain make up the Universe. Given a Domain it has a complement that Exists. A law is a pattern in some Domain that we read. The Law is the pattern. Laws have Being and are therefore in the Universe. The complement of the Universe is called the Void. The Void Exists (it is the complement of a Domain); it contains no Laws (all Laws are in its complement, the Universe)

Demonstration of the Universal Metaphysics

8. If from the Void some conceived state does not emerge, that would be a Law in the Void. Therefore every state can emerge from the Void. I.e. the Universe has no Limits in the sense that every state can emerge. This includes states not present in our cosmos or disallowed by its physical laws. The only conceived or conceivable states whose non-Being would not constitute a Limit are those that violate logic: logic is not a Limit on Being but is a constraint on the Realism of our concepts that arises because conceptualization allows the freedom, e.g., of contradiction which is one of the so called laws of logic. However, there is no law of logic, even contradiction that is above question (the explosive character of consequences of contradiction can be contained). Therefore define Logic as the constraints on referential concepts for their realization; it is not empty for the logics are approximations to it; many results of this formulation are trivial deductions but require interpretation. This notion of Logic is immensely open and awaits discovery. The Logos, the object of Logic is the Universe in all its detail

The Metaphysics and its Consequences

Main Consequences. Realism

9. The Universe has no Limits; (i.e. it is the Greatest possible); this is named the Principle of Being (PB). I.e., the only constraints on knowledge are those of Realism (a) Factual or empirical—agreement with experience (and science) in its valid domains (b) Conceptual or Logical which is approximated by our logics and (c) Existential or Truth which includes attitude and action in relation to our Limited forms. It follows that (1) The variety, extension, and duration of Being is without Limit, e.g., that there are cosmological systems without Limit, and more, against a transient background. The Universe has manifest and unmanifest phases (2) The Universe has Identity in acute, diffuse, and unmanifest phases (3) Except for occasions and conditions of coexistence, Limitlessness (and Identity) is assumed by all Individuals (4) For a Limited, e.g. human, form this occurs in Identity with the Limitless (shedding Limits) or, otherwise, while remaining limited in journey without limit to variety, summit and dissolution, extension and duration (but all forms have continuity or soul even through death and unmanifest phases of the Universe). In Limitlessness the distinction between Idea and Being or Idea and Action dissolves

We see that science, Logic, and a healthy relation to truth are parts of Realism. These may be seen as external, internal, and intrinsic or whole. Inclusion of science under Logic would be counter to the modern conception of logic as deduction. However, as agreement with fact the stretch is not great; nor does in go against logic as deduction. We see that science and metaphysics are not separated by an impassable barrier: in both cases knowledge is important with regard to detail and certainty: in metaphysics we sacrifice detail while in science we sacrifice certainty. To incorporate the existential would be more of a stretch but the join would nonetheless be healthy and, as join, would have no formal impact on Logic except the recognition that no realm of endeavor is certain. Thus we admit doubt regarding the demonstration above (it is however not absurd; there is no contradiction of fact, concept, or truth). This mirrors a philosophy of logic and mathematics that in many of their more interesting realms we must tolerate some uncertainty

The Universal Metaphysics is not an alternative to or competitor with science. The metaphysics goes beyond science (immensely) but does and must agree with science and experience in their valid domains. There remains still the seeming disagreement that our scientific experience seems so firm at its core but in its freedom the metaphysics seems to confirm this. The logical response remains unchanged: the metaphysics must also confirm what is valid in our sense of firmness of our experience, of the world, and of the core of science. This may be put another way. Our cosmos is an infinitesimal part of the Universe. However while part of our cosmos we normally obey its normal laws. I.e. where we sometimes think that the laws of science are necessary they are in fact highly probable (in some sense). That is, while part of the cosmos we experience its experienced and scientifically coded behavior as Normal. There are and must be exceptions but these are too rare to (normally) regard as significant. What then is the significance of the metaphysics? (1) It promotes ways to find exceptions to the Normal. On reflection this is what the history of science reveals: what is unknown in one time becomes commonplace later, what is thought impossible at one time becomes natural in later science, and (2) Although there is no guarantee of super-Normal in our limited form, there is certainty of transcendence in death (realization of the Universal but little probabilistic support for the visions of the religious cosmologies and eschatologies: in this connection the modern scientific literature on the future of the universe is interesting even though not widely read). The foregoing considerations reconcile apparent conceptual and practical conflict between science and the metaphysics. They also explain my interest in science and technology in the realization revealed by the metaphysics: open and as complementary to the more direct ways below (§ Introduction to The Way)

Systematic Consequences

10. Some ideational consequences of the metaphysics are (1) Metaphysics proper: a non-relative foundation for Being without substance and implicit representation of the variety of Being. The metaphysics is ultimate in depth and breadth; and it further shows the ultimate character of the Universe (2) A new conception of Logic (3) A Theory of Objects. Every referential concept has an Object somewhere even if not in our cosmos. The detailed empirical theories of science of a finite form cannot approach representation of the entire Universe; however they are facts over limited phenomenal (including extension and duration) Domains. The developer of a metaphysics that claims to outstretch science might be thought to be critical of or against science; however, I am not at all against science and in this conception cannot (logically) be against science (and as far as uses are concerned there are positive and negative uses of science as there may also be of my metaphysics and any human endeavor including criticism). Abstract Objects similarly fall under the foregoing umbrella: they must have reference even though such reference will be ‘abstractive’ in nature; it will not be non-causal or atemporal but may have had causation and temporality omitted from what was abstracted. This is a unified theory of abstract and concrete objects. All Objects, concrete or perceptual / abstract or conceptual whether iconic or symbolic and even concepts themselves reside in the one Universe: there is no system of separate worlds such as the physical, the mental, and the Platonic. Here there is a potential interaction of metaphysics and science in bringing together the different approaches to objects: perfect and abstract in metaphysics and imperfect but detailed in science. In developing an Applied Metaphysics ‘value’ and ‘good enough’ criteria may lead to a join of science and metaphysics. (4) A Cosmology as noted above. Here we may see the interaction of science and metaphysics: science is suggestive in its role here, in metaphysics we analyze which of these suggestions can be demonstrative; metaphysics in turn is suggestive for science; which suggestions may be taken up and regarded as hypothesis (this latter point is a suggestion). If some future version of, say, quantum theory should contain PB it will remain true that experience of the Universe will remain a journey without end for limited forms (even if there were an unlimited power to take a limited form on such a journey). (5) A theory of Power and Identity for the Universe. There is no God outside the Universe as creator. However, there are occasional Personified Forces that have influence on large domains. The case is not personalism versus pantheism but it is pantheism together with personalism. One can disbelieve the existence of the God of various belief systems; however, without full characterization of the conceptual range of possibilities and perhaps some attempt at empirical realism thereof one cannot meaningfully be a blanket atheist. There are mediate powers: nature, mind, other human beings and cultures; these are our first access to the ultimate power of the Universe

A Journey in Being

Overview

11. For finite form the journey is unending: realization is a Journey in Being; it is anchored in the world (and its cumulative culture and tradition up to the present) of the individual; which (journey) requires ideas (for appreciation and effectiveness) but must be completed by transformation of Being; while there are no guarantees for any given Limited form the ultimate of every form is the realized Universe; and there are ways to this journey without limit; their basis lies in the intersection and interaction of the metaphysics, the tradition, ideas (construction and criticism), experience, and experiment—in this world; there is no final expert or teacher for this journey; its essential tension is the one between determinism and Freedom. Ideas are essential in this journey as enjoyment and partial guide but are incomplete without action and transformation (of Being)

Introduction to The Way

I should perhaps replace ‘The Way’ by ‘Ways’

12. The way. The metaphysics, the tradition (including academia, science and technology; and the more traditional aspects of tradition: philosophies and practices of being and action such as yoga, meditation and more recent forms such as psychoanalysis), cultivation, reflex, experience, experiment, practice, and action (and practice-in-action) which result in a dynamics that comes to light and may be cultivated. Religion is the use of all dimensions of Being in the realization of All Being. You can adopt or leave this conception. Life and action are enhanced by practice; practice alone is not useless: it is without meaning. There are teachers of traditional and modern practices, there is no final expert; relative to the Universe we are together and alone: there is no external lever. Some teachers are angry, some have this presentation; it is their practical virtue not their anger or softness that is important. The way begins here and moves out incrementally; you may focus on perhaps stop at some practice; then you will likely be stopped but—at least you are there. There is no ultimate for a finite form; but there may be various images of the ultimate; these are not merely cognitive but they lie also in feeling, behavior, attitude; they are accessed by practice and action; and by catalytic activities; and maintained by renewal and learning and growth; there is no ultimate barrier to limited forms; realization in this form would be the end of this cosmos; without realization in this form, the soul continues on toward ultimate realization and dissolution. We are tempted to label attitude ‘faith’ if this would not lead to the corrupted meaning of the term. Faith is the attitude that is conducive of greatest outcome

The Future

The following is the content of the chapter FUTURE AND PAST of Journey in Being-final.html

Includes plans and planning—general and specific

Primary Phase. Being

Ideas and Action (Transformation)

Ideas

Program of study and research, see § Ideas, Action… (in Web page Journey in Being-final)

Writing and communication—talking, speaking, and publishing

Study for Transformation of Being: Metaphysics, Science, Technology; Ways, Catalysts

Transformation of Being (Action)

… includes action, experiment, real transformation

Study for Transformation of Being: Metaphysics, Science, Technology; Dynamics, Ways, Catalysts (repeats entry under previous section, Ideas)

Practice into action; sharing

Experiments and accomplishments so far

Special Phase. Technology and Artifact

Being (Technology of life, mind, and spirit) and Action (Science and Technology of Society)

Organic-Mechanical

Ideas and experiments in building life and mind

Materials—material and organic

Approaches—design for emulation (simulation) and adaptation (variation and selection), use of randomness and ad hoc elements

Implementation—mechanical and organic, analog, symbolic and computational

Social

Society—sharing with focus on the ultimate

Tools and Ways

Political, economic; system (patriarchal) and charisma

Future of social technology (primitive to modern science, future of science and religion: participation and immersion, religion as the use of all dimensions of Being in realization of mediate powers and All Power and Being

Issues

Civilization, its analysis and future with robust prognostics; the metaphysics and value; state of civilization (world) with problem and opportunity

Practice into Action

Mind and Spirit—practice (yoga… visualization, preparation, planning)… action

Body—health, diet, routine, adaptation, physiological conditioning

System of Experiments

See § The Way in universal journey-ways.html

For experiments so far see:

§ Dynamics of Being in Journey in Being-final

§ Illustrations of the dynamic in Journey in being-detail.html

Principles

Dynamics (framework: the metaphysics), Tradition, Learning (experience, imagination, experiment, realism), Reflex

Phase of Being

Mediate—ultimate

See Primary Phase. Being above

Self, Culture and Society

Right living in relation to self; thinking in relation to others

Charisma is generosity and patience

Psyche, Spirit, Body / Being

Emphasis—the world and the ultimate

Practice—yoga, meditation… as training in focus—focus in action, transition to transformation

Nature and Catalytic Practice

Contact, catalysts, yoga (meditation—Raja Yoga, Jnâna Yoga)

See dynamics, catalysts and catalytic states.html

Reflection, review

Special Phase

See Special Phase. Technology and Artifact above

Organic-Mechanical Being

Study and design

Construction

Social

Study and planning; value and plan of action

Preparation, action, sharing

Civilization, problem, opportunity

A Guide to Time and Place

Details and concrete specifics of my life, preparation, and planning; see § A Guide to Time and Place (in Journey in Being-final)

ESSENTIALS OF THE CENTRAL STATEMENTS

CREATED JUNE 19, 3012

ANIL MITRA PHD © JUNE 19, 2012 AND July 11, 2012

Note. The following has a set of narrative footnotes. In a final version I may convert these to simple notes. One way to do this and also maintain links is to save in HTML format for this eliminates the footnote / main text distinction while keeping the links. In doing this it will be convenient to work with a temporary document whose contents are those of this Heading 1 section

The Two Essential Statements

The Universe is the Greatest (possible), i.e. it has no Limits in the sense that the Universe is the object of Logic (which includes factual or scientific, Logical, and Truth or Existential Realism). It follows (1) The variety, extension, and duration of Being is without Limit, e.g., that there are cosmological systems without Limit, and more, against a transient background (2) The Universe has manifest and unmanifest phases (3) The Universe has Identity in acute, diffuse, and unmanifest phases (3) Except for conditions of coexistence, Limitlessness and Identity are assumed by all Individuals (4) For a finite form this occurs via identity with the Limitless or, otherwise, in journey without limit to variety, summit and dissolution, extension and duration (but all forms have continuity or soul even through death and unmanifest phases of the Universe

For finite form the journey is unending: realization is a Journey in Being; it is anchored in the world (and its cumulative culture and tradition up to the present) of the individual; which (journey) requires ideas (for appreciation and effectiveness) but must be completed by transformation of Being; while there are no guarantees for any given Limited form the ultimate of every form is the realized Universe; and there are ways to this journey without limit; their basis lies in the intersection and interaction of the metaphysics, the tradition, ideas (construction and criticism), experience, and experiment—in this world; there is no final expert or teacher for this journey; its essential tension is the one between determinism and Freedom

The Essential Ideas 1, Concepts 2 and their Meaning 3

Being 4 is that which Exists 5—at large or over some Domain 6. The Universe 7 is All Being—it contains all Laws 8; it is demonstrated that there is and can be only One Universe 9 which is the Greatest 10 (possible universe), i.e. that the Universe is Limitless 11; a pivotal concept in demonstration of these and subsequent assertions is that of the Void 12; this limitlessness is here named the Principle of Being 13 (PB); PB raises significant issues of Doubt and the possibility of Metaphysics 14; the essential doubts and their consequences are the subject of Realism 15 and Experience 16 whose components are and the issue of Truth 17, empirical validity including Science 18, and Conceptual Realism 19 and Logic 20 (and the Logos 21). This development constitutes a view of the Universe—centered on PB—in the form of a demonstrated metaphysics named the Universal Metaphysics 22; this metaphysics is unique and, so, is also referred to as the metaphysics; it is ultimate in depth 23 (foundation) and breadth 24 (implicit representation of All Being) and it reveals the Universe as Ultimate. It is the foundation of a General Cosmology 25 of the Universe is that, from these considerations, is a Limitless Cosmology. From PB / the metaphysics it follows that the Universe has Identity 26 which has acute, diffuse, and unmanifest phases The implications 27 of the metaphysics indeed impressive: they include treatments of Objects 28, of Power 29

Limitlessness implies that except conditions of coexistence the Identity and Limitlessness of the Universe is ‘conferred’ (agency is not required even if efficient) on every individual; since the Universe is without Limit, realization for a finite form requires either assumption of Limitless form or unending process: a unending process whose variety of Being, summit and dissolution, and extension and duration is without Limit. This process is appropriately called a Journey in Being 30. We assume ultimate not eternal form and the latter simply because the Universe goes through unmanifest phases (however PB requires the remnant of an imprint which we may call soul which is ever present but which may / may not enter consciousness to finite form). For finite form the journey is unending: realization is a Journey in Being; it is anchored in the world (and its cumulative culture and tradition up to the present) of the individual; which (journey) requires ideas (for appreciation and effectiveness) but must be completed by transformation of Being; while there are no guarantees for any given Limited form the ultimate of every form is the realized Universe; and there are Ways 31 to this journey without limit; their basis lies in the intersection and interaction of the metaphysics, the tradition, ideas (construction and criticism), experience, and experiment—in this world; there is no final expert or teacher for this journey; its essential tension is the one between determinism and Freedom 32

Notes

CENTRAL STATEMENTS I

July 11, 2012

ANIL MITRA

Older Material

A Brief Set of Central Statements

Being transcends all categories and distinctions; its study is neutral and emergent; all Laws have Being

The Universe is all Being; the Void is the absence of Being and so of Law. Therefore All States are Given (PB)—i.e., the Universe has no limits

Some consequences. (1) There is no limit to cosmological variety—i.e., to the variety, extension, and duration of Being in the Universe (2) Excepting conditions of coexistence, limitlessness must be inherited by all individuals (and domains) (3) The Universe has Identity. This Identity has acute and diffuse phases—see details below (4) These conclusions do not violate but in fact require what is valid in science and reflective common sense (TRADITION) as necessary rather than contingent. Analysis of TRADITION in its own terms show it to be without estimation of the size of the region outside its domain of validity; and PB shows and requires this outside region to be without limit (5) Logic is the requirement on concepts of referential type in order that they have reference (under PB). Then Logic includes the valid portions of the logics but immensely more in terms of extent and variety—without limit (it would seem). Logos, the object of Logic, is the Universe in all its detail

The Universe has Identity with acute and diffuse phases; individual identity is equivalent to Universal Identity (PI); realization of Universal identity is unending, a Journey in Being, a journey without limit to extension, duration, or variety; this entails summits without end or limit and their dissolutions

The way is via the above metaphysics, the tradition, experience and experiment. Yoga is the practice and engagement in action of mind and body that lies at the beginning of the journey

A set of issues

Place of Human Being. (1) Framework (experience) (2) ‘Essence’ (3) Destiny. Human world; action and state of the world; see A set of global issues.doc

PB—proof, implications, meaning / doubt / faith

System of implications. Human, academic (or action / idea)

Journey. (1) Nature (2) Origins of the idea—personal, tradition, development of UMET (3) Framework, way (practice, catalyst, experiment), (minimal but spanning) system of experiments

Central Statements—A Short Version

2—Meta and Para material

Since ideas and text are in the world there is no meta or para material for a text on metaphysics—all meta material should be material

Meta—about the text

Para—design of text and experience… continuous with life

4—Introduction

5—Ideas

2—[Being, Metaphysics, Method] [Universe]

Method. Metaphysics—abstraction, analysis of meaning, naming the given; neutrality, emergence, inclusivity and distinction, and the reflex. Science—projective hypothesis, suggestion, test. Applied Metaphysics—mesh of tradition and the ideal, study of context

1—[Void, Principle of Being—PB] PB—The Universe has no limits

1A—Fundamental objections to PB

Two clarifying objections to the Logical form of PB (‘Every assertion about the Universe is true.’) Objection 1. External coherence. PB seems to contradict fact (Universe is not the way it is) Objection 2. Internal coherence. PB seems to allow contradictory assertions about the Universe

1A—Meaning and Significance of PB

Here, the meaning of PB is what it says in precise terms and its significance is its system implications—academic, universal, and human. There is overlap but roughly meaning is intrinsic and significance is in implications

Some confusions of the meaning of PB: (1) PB means that the Universe is infinite in spatial extent. Response. It is an implication but far from the full implication seen in Logic, Objects, Cosmology, Applied Metaphysics (2) According to modern physical cosmology the Universe is finite and therefore limited. Response. Modern physical cosmology applies only to an infinitesimal part of the Universe. The domains of the Universe must be found in some way; these are contingent facts and not limits though they may be experienced as limits; and the contingencies are required by PB (3) Confusion. That Logic must be satisfied is a limit. Response. Logic or conceptual realism is not a limit on the Universe but necessary and sufficient constraint for propositional conceptions to have objects

The significance of PB lies primarily in its interpretation and elaboration—in its metaphysical, academic, human, and transformational application—and, also, in meaning

8—[PB—Cosmological Form] [Matter, Mind, and Identity]

2—Individual identity is equivalent to Universal Identity

2A—Meaning and Significance of the Identity. Journey

An essential aspect of the meaning of this assertion is the description of Universal Identity and demonstration of its necessity

An essential aspect of its significance lies in its entailment and ways of realization (a) Becoming or transformation is an endless journey and (b) Realization in ‘this’ form by TRANS-ACTION (understood as DYNAMICS, CATALYSTS…) and its practice. I regard (a) as superior and complete but (b) is the beginning way

General significance includes enhanced understanding of Being, human being, and their relation

6—The World and the Universe are—ultimately—the same (new)

9—Realism (i.e., conceptual realism) is the condition for the system of concepts to have reference

10—[Logic—necessary and sufficient, physics, theory of objects—implicit in UJ, and cosmology]

11—[Power, science, God, lesser powers, access to Power via mediate power]

3—Journey

3—Realization is given and is and endless journey: and of summits, plateaus, and dissolutions; of summits without limit to variety or elevation; a journey whose appreciation and realization is immensely enhanced by engagement of all dimensions of being in realization of all being

12—There is a way

13—Self identity is ever coming into Being. In the life of the spirit we are always at the beginning. There is no final nirvana, overcoming, samsara, Samadhi, death, or pain)

14—[Moment and Universe… through Religion]

2'—Transformation and Guide

2'—The way of the Journey

Internal (e.g. meditation), external (nature, society, and culture; catalyst and system). Ultimate—above, in the discussion of Religion

15—Contexts, targets, modes, means…

Pre-Central Statements

Introduction

Universal Journey: Origin and Nature

The Work

Motive

(Audience)

Reading the Text

Preliminary to Being

Being is what is there; metaphysics is the study of Being

The significance of Being and the possibility of metaphysics have been questioned. Experience will be a royal path to address of these issues

Experience

Besides, experience is fundamental in itself

Experience is subjective awareness with or without an object

This preliminary definition has a number of problems

There are other meanings of ‘experience’

It requires awareness to be defined

What is an object and what is its meaning

Address the problems

That there are other meanings. We use this meaning; other meanings or ‘senses’ are not competitive but simply different. In the context of metaphysics this is the most effective use (criteria of effectiveness are made explicit later)

Make the following more precise (and brief)

That awareness needs to be defined. Define it in terms of examples. Why? Some terms must be so defined or else there can be no definite meanings at all. To make this thought precise consider an apparent paradox

A dictionary paradox. Every word in the dictionary is defined in terms of other words that are also in the dictionary and so dictionary definitions are circular. The way out is to recognize that there is some set of basic words whose meanings are established in use—in the context of their use. This set of words need not be explicitly specified but the establishment of dictionary meaning requires the existence of such a set of words. Some of these word ideas are so fundamental that there is no defining them in terms of something more fundamental. Experience as experience is such an idea. We can define experience as awareness and awareness, for example, as consciousness… finally back to experience and though this is no definition at some point one of the words may connect with the dictionary user’s knowledge (thus ‘circular’ definitions though lacking in a logical sense may nonetheless convey meaning). In the case of experience, however, since there are alternate meanings and since the user’s (reader’s) knowledge may be incomplete it is perhaps best to attempt to point out what experience is (ostensive definition) and to supplement that pointing by examples. The rough ostensive definition is that experience is what we are having when we are feeling, when we are aware, when we are conscious, when we are in a state of perceptual apprehension of something

Now for some examples of experience. The fragrance of a rose is an example; others are the brilliance of a sunset; pain; the clear sense of a sentence or an image in thought or the sense of a sequence of thought (the last examples shows that experience is not mere simple feeling). Although we may question the precise nature of smell of a rose, the brilliance of a sunset and so on, experience is so basic that its meaning becomes clear from the examples

The problem of objectivity. When I experience a rose (its shape, texture, fragrance) I may question the accuracy of my perception. This questioning has two sources. First, and most fundamental that I am experiencing something in the world means that the experience is a joint product of (my) mind and the world. Generally, the ‘object’ is a thing that is compound of projection and world

However, experience is so basic that we have no question regarding the fact of experience

In the case of experience we know it perfectly. In this case, concept (the knowing) and object (experience as such) are both perfect and perfectly matched. We may say that here is an example of a concept and its perfect object

As conceived here (e.g. relatively high level human experience) concept and object are both perfect and of the same kind (a material object and its concept do not seem to be of the same kind). Later we will see that this distinction is an approximation and that what we have here understood as experience may be broadened to absolute inclusivity

The significance of experience

There is a metaphysical significance; it is that There is experience (i.e. experience is an example of Being)

The ‘existential’ and fundamental significance to sentient beings—experience is presence of a sentient being in the world. It is the fundamental medium of significance. Without experience we might as well be ‘mechanical robots’

We begin to see that experience is a primal case of Being; we will later see an effective sense in which experience is primal Being

Meaning

Meaning requires concept and object. Without recognizing both, we are led into confusion and error

When there is no obvious object there is always an implicit object

Because contexts are changing—and this includes simple improvement, meaning requires fluidity. However, for effective use there must be balance between fixity and fluidity

Dictionaries cannot be definitive but require knowledge of context. Thus, though useful, dictionaries are limited, especially in expanding and otherwise changing contexts

Meaning can be fixed only in an ultimate context

However, because there are alternative modes of expression, even in perfect knowledge of contexts—ultimate or otherwise—meaning is not fixed; and there is further play of meaning in understanding the details

Discussion of meaning in all contexts requires attention to system and to the dual of concept and object or sense and reference (denotation / connotation, intension / extension)

Doubt

Functions of doubt

Doubts regarding experience. The following are extreme poles (1) There is no experience (as in, e.g., some versions of scientific materialism), (2) There is only experience (Solipsism but this is already empty for if there is only experience then there cannot be experience of anything and we cannot know that there is only experience; this of course makes solipsism empty but does not establish a robust real world beyond experience and recursive experience)

Fact of Experience

Doubts regarding experience (1) There is no experience. Response. Experience is given; we name it. It is opposed by scientific materialists; but this is error. And it is not felt by the dull; we shall let them be. Consequence. Experience is essential. Method. Recognition and naming of the given, i.e. ostensive definition of the fundamental. Note on eliminativism. Doubt 1, in the context of study of mind, leads some thinkers to eliminativism. In its most radical form eliminativism is the claim that there is no mind at all. In less radical forms it is the claim that our ordinary common sense understanding (‘folk psychology’) of mind is deeply wrong and that some or all of the mental states posited by common-sense do not actually exist. One version of eliminativism is that mental states are nothing but brain states. Doubt. (1a) A related position is epiphenomenalism: there is mind (there are mental states) but these have no material or causal significance: they are simply along for the ride… like the foam of the wave. Response. Ask first what the sources of eliminativism and epiphenomenalism may be. For some there may be intuitive / subjective difficulties with experience and consciousness but I think this is a personal affair and is itself a spurious folk-like psychology; we may set this aside. Still, there are two serious concerns. One concern is the proper description of mental states. I think the correct response to this is that this is indeed a fundamental problem and most of our descriptions that have any faithfulness andor depth are in the nature of the case (subtlety, complexity, opacity) likely to be partial and approximate. This however should be equally true of ‘folk’ and ‘formal’ descriptions (from the assertion that it is equally true of the folk and the formal that they are likely to be partial and approximate it does not follow that one cannot be better than the other). Knowledge of our mental states is ever a work in progress. The second concern is ‘categorial’—i.e., mind and matter are different categories and there is no place for mind in any proper (scientific) account. (The epiphenomenalist position would be that there is no place for a causal description of mind in any proper account.) There is, I think, a fundamental misunderstanding behind these positions which I shall state now but develop and argue later. The misunderstanding concerns the difference between fundamental categories and descriptive andor experiential categories. Our experience of our experience makes it seem quite different from our experience of ‘external’ and material objects; this seeming difference is buttressed by an impressive physical science that makes no reference to mind or mental states in its description of material reality and by anatomical and physiological descriptions of the body. My argument is not going to be ‘but no matter how precise and pervasive these modes of description may be they are incomplete or wrong.’ They probably are incomplete and if we think of them as universal they are probably wrong even on scientific terms but to make my argument clearer and stronger I shall take them to be not only excellent within their domain of validity but also to be complete, final, and universal. The argument at core will start, simply, with the observation that since the concepts and laws of physical science make no reference to mind, mind is absent from or alien to matter. Right here is the essential categorial confusion. Mind may indeed be a separate category from matter but this does not follow from any science. An alternative to the position of the categorial divide, and one that is not in contradiction to the material and natural sciences, is that the elements of what constitute mind, e.g. our experiencing of ‘things’, are already present in matter even though they do not enter into our descriptions of matter and that while descriptions of mental and material affairs seem to refer to different ‘things’ they refer only to different modes of experience and description. In other words when I refer to mind I am also but tacitly referring to matter, when I refer to mental causation I am also but tacitly referring to material causation. Now, it does not follow from the fact of there mental causation, e.g. when I do something that I intend to do, that (i) mind is a causative agent distinct from material causation (the two kinds of cause are two kinds of description of the same entity) or that (ii) I have all the mental causative powers that I naïvely think that I do. Regarding (ii) there are two extremes of thought; one extreme is that we have no mental power over things at all (a kind of eliminativism or epiphenomenalism) and the other extreme, polar to the first, is that I can do whatever I choose to intend. There are, under the aegis of natural law, limits to what I can do; some limits are blunt (I cannot jump twenty vertical feet up), but others are fine and await discovery, e.g. limits to intellect. Remark. Later we will analyze the precise nature of the apparently absolute limit of natural law and find that the only absolute limits are those of logic and that these are not material limits but limits to the realizability of concepts

Fact of Real World

Doubts regarding experience (2) A second doubt is somewhat the opposite to the first. It is that everything is experience—i.e., what we take to be the world is a vast field of experience. There is a position called solipsism—everything is the field of experience of a single individual (‘myself’). Response. The statement has inconsistency. And it does not stand up to analysis of its meaning. (Details supplied later.) Consequence. There is a real (‘external’) world corresponding to a significant domain of experience; our knowledge of it is robust. Method. Consistency, analysis of meaning

Existence

Doubts regarding existence

Fact and robustness of existence

Existence and Being

Meaning of Being

Central Statements: Ideas

Being

Definition of Being

Fact of Being (FB)

Doubt. There is no Being. Response. Preliminary—if there were not neither these words nor illusion of them would be. Essential—we have seen the robustness of Being in considering experience. Consequence and Method. Doubt is illuminating, clarifying, and leads to robust demonstration. Being is a neutral container and its method is abstraction. There are two fundamental questions ‘Why is there Being?’; it is later found that there must be; the other—and therefore the fundamental—question is ‘What has Being?’

Meaning and Significance of FB

Distinction (difference), Extension, Duration, Domain, Spatiotemporal Domain (stuff)

Definition of Law. Law and Domains have Being

Definition of Universe, Law and Universe, Complement, Existence of Complement

Void, Existence of Void, Contains no Being (Law) But has Being

PB—formulation in terms of concepts

Metaphysics (and Epistemology)

What is metaphysics?

The question could have been answered in discussing experience but it is effective to defer discussion till this point

Is metaphysics possible?

History of impossibility of metaphysics. Metaphysic of experience. For perfect objects metaphysics and metaphysic of experience are identical. This might seem near vacuous but as seen there is a variety of perfect objects

Immediately below and then in what follows this variety is extended immensely, first for perfect objects then in an appropriate sense to all things

A variety of consequences of the Principle of Being

The strategy for development is as follows. Later sections develop elaboration and application of the metaphysics

Include Biblical comment?

Doubt

Internal, External, and Intrinsic Doubts / Objections

Internal®Logic

External®Science, Experience

Intrinsic®Alternate proof, residual doubt, existential attitude, faith

Logic

Definition of Logic. PB—formulation(s) in terms of Logic (1 formulation), Universe (2 formulations)

Conceptual realism

Other formulations—the six forms etc.

Substance

Substance. Relative and non-relative metaphysics

Science

Contingent fact and Normal ‘limit’

Fantasy. Religious and mythical cosmologies

Combine with preliminary metaphysical variety

The objection and criticism of fragility need not apply to all cases

The symbolic meaning of fantasy, religion, and myth is strengthened but this does not imply perfection

The Universal Metaphysics

Before or after Applied metaphysics

Unique, ultimate, and universal

Applied Metaphysics

Two meanings

Criteria for perfection

Attitude. Faith

Alternate proof and heuristics. Existential attitude. Faith

Demonstration after all

Faith

Method

Creative. Imagination, creative concept formation. Doubt, Simplicity, Neutrality and Emergence, Reflexivity—e.g., Construction and Criticism. Horizontal reflex—‘cross-fertilization’. Vertical—conceptual systems and facts as data

Critical and formal. Abstraction, analysis of meaning, naming the given; and their conceptual-experiential (empirical) character (no absolute a priori). Logic and Demonstration. Reflex: abstraction and other elements are simultaneously critical and imaginative

Simultaneous emergence of method and content (method is content)

Principle of Being

PB—keep here? Or place in metaphysics

Meaning and Significance of PB

Individual Identity is Universal Identity (PI)

Meaning and Significance of PI

Objects and Cosmology

Particular and abstract objects

General cosmology. Variety. Space-time

Mind and matter

Power

Mediate and ultimate powers

Science, God, lesser powers, access via mediate power

Religion

Central Statements: Journey

Personal origin

Metaphysical source and implication

The way

Includes the future

Journey so far

Post Central Statements: Application of the Ideas

Nature and Science

Human Being

The Human World

Society and The World

The State, Politics and Economics

Culture, Knowledge, and Education

Religion

CENTRAL STATEMENTS II

Home

Plan. Reduce and then re-elaborate. Note and further implement the use of style DetailChar

Do we need to call these things principles?

Metatext

METATEXT is text about a text. Ideas, words, text and speech are in the world. So, in metaphysics there is no meta-idea, meta-word, metatext, or para-text

The boundary between text, idea, and world is porous. At the most inclusive level of content there is no metatext; and what might have been metatext shall appear as text

Being

BEING is what is there. There are other special uses of Being—Being as essence, as in-itself, as opposed to becoming; Being as divinity; Being as ineffable, as deep, as mystery, and so on; these are not excluded by the present use and what is valid in them is included in it; and, if it is neither inconsistent nor unrealistic to say ‘non-Being is there’, then even non-Being has or is a case of Being. The power of the present use of Being includes its neutrality which does not force our conceptions upon the world but allows understanding to emerge without (conservative) force but also without eternal (liberal) non-commitment; that it is not special but includes all that is special is a source of its power. The metaphysics defined shortly below and developed subsequently will show—despite its apparent triviality—the ultimate foundational depth of the present notion of Being; it will found those objects whose form and therefore conception depend only on their Being—the variety of such objects is without limit and includes those of a developed unique, universal, and ultimate metaphysics; and it will leave open the problems of the nature and form of other objects and other notions of Being which, from the metaphysics, are also without limit and whose account shall remain every open; but it will implicitly include what is valid in these objects; and it is an objective to develop understanding of some such select ideas by means that include some that are external to those of the present pure metaphysics. Although the form of some experienced-objects receives contribution from experience the being of Being should and does not depend on our experience or on being in our experience. However, our acquaintance with and knowledge of the fact of Being arises in and from experience—There is Being; this is identically given and given in experience

Experience

EXPERIENCE is subjective awareness with or without an object. Experience is an aspect of our Being and, at least, an instance of Being. It is the intimate presence of a sentient agent—in Being and to the world. Awareness (knowledge) of Being first arises in direct experience and experience is the medium of all knowledge regarding which the individual says ‘I know’ (i.e., while the structure of the body and computer models can be seen as forms of knowledge, they do not occur in the ‘I’ and therefore to say of them that ‘I know’ has no meaning.) Analysis of experience shows that it guarantees its own Being and further shows experience (knowledge) of Being to be robust—that there is a real world (sometimes confusingly called the external world) that includes experience and that is the object of experience. It is not asserted or suggested that Being depends on experience, i.e. on being experienced. However the nature of experience and its categorial and material (causal) relations to Being remain to be worked out

Universe

The UNIVERSE is all Being. The Universe has no limits—this is the PRINCIPLE OF BEING (PB) whose meaning lies significantly in its derivation. This is PB in its immanent form; there are a number of forms that essentially reduce to two. The other essential form is the conceptual form which invokes a new concept of LOGIC as the condition on concepts that is necessary and sufficient for correspondence to objects: LOGOS, the object of Logic, is the Universe in all its detail. It follows that the Universe experiences states of manifest Being and of non-manifestation; and that the Universe enters into and experiences states of acute and diffuse identity

Metaphysics

METAPHYSICS is the study of Being as such. There are traditions in Western Philosophy that hold metaphysics to be impossible because it cannot be part of experience. Here we have seen that the METHODS of ABSTRACTION of detail that is not subject to distortion and which is therefore empirical and in experience even for Logic, NAMING OF THE GIVEN (e.g. in abstraction), and ANALYSIS OF MEANING (also empirical) lead to demonstration of a metaphysics. A further difficulty concerning metaphysics is its very conception—see, for example, the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article Metaphysics which concludes that there is no current satisfactory definition. From the Universal Metaphysics it becomes clear that there cannot be a satisfactory conception of metaphysics without some clear and definitive development of the subject. For example if we regard metaphysics as the study of Being then without the development of metaphysics it will not be clear what falls under Being and therefore what topics are and what are not metaphysics. The Universal Metaphysics clears up this confusion and PB empowers the elementary notion that metaphysics is the study of Being

Demonstration of PB

The essence of the demonstration of PB is this. There is Being (abstraction from experience, naming); a LAW is our experience of a pattern in a limited domain, the corresponding LAW is the pattern; Laws have Being; the Universe is conceived-defined as all Being; the Universe contains all Laws; a DOMAIN is a system of phenomena and its COMPLEMENT is the part of the Universe excluded by it; given a domain it has a complement—i.e. its complement EXISTS (is there); the reader is referred to details of resolution of the well known and other problems of the concept of existence; the VOID is defined as the complement of the Universe; the Void exists but contains no Being and therefore no Laws; if there were some state that did not emerge from the Void, that would be a Law of the Void and therefore every logical referential concept is realized and, further, the Void may be regarded as the generator of all Being and this resolves the problem of SUBSTANCE; the logical form of the conclusion is questionable on account of problems with classical and modern logics and therefore Logic is defined as the requirement on referential conceptual systems to have objects; therefore every system of concepts that is Logical is realized; Logic and therefore its realization is far from empty or merely implicit because the logics are at least approximations to it; this seems as though it is a limit on the Universe but it is not for Logic pertains to well formed-ness or conceptual realism of conceptual systems and is not a limit on Being or Universe; and, finally, therefore, the Universe has no limits

Consequences of PB

An example of a CONSEQUENCE of PB is that there are physical laws without limit and realizations of each law in cosmological systems without limit. This appears to contradict science and common experience but it does not for these pertain to what we have seen and there are edges to experience and the empirical that are windows on a beyond whose variety, extension, and duration are unknown in science and experience (when we think that the domain beyond the borders is shrinking to a small region we have in our minds the mistaken thought that the outside region is more or less as revealed in science or experience so far). In fact, in their valid domains, science and experience are required by PB. Science and experience appear to be limits on Being but they are not for while they are experienced as limits they are overcome in the ultimate (as required by PB). We should normally continue to consider science and experience to constitute limits but these are neither ultimate nor logical limits; we may call them simply contingent facts or normal limits. In the absence of the demonstrated universal metaphysics, we are likely to confuse our cosmos with the Universe and therefore with the contingent facts of our cosmos with limits on the Universe; that the cosmos is some way is not a limit. PB implies a variety of Being beyond what is empirical and calculable within the current hypothetico-deductive methods of SCIENCE (inclusive of falsifiability and testability) and show what is already beginning to be accepted in the social sciences and anthropology: that while the classical methods of science will continue to be locally useful, their ultimate future must expand to include participation and immersion (and of course this is already what we do in practice even though we idealize the case as otherwise)

Identity of Experience and Being

Provided that the terms are interpreted with sufficient care and abstraction, there is IDENTITY OF EXPERIENCE AND BEING and IDENTITY OF MIND AND MATTER. There is resolution of the essential problems of metaphysics, e.g. existence—and sentience, and the real or external world; form and substance (form is superficial and there is no substance although there are local as-if forms and substances); categories, universals, particulars; God; soul, mind and matter (body); determinism, cause and action, free will; some aspects of truth, reason, value; nature and possibility of metaphysics and ontology (ontology is superficial); knowledge as a metaphysical object—experience and knowledge are definite ontological objects and their proper development reveals the coeval and codependent origin of metaphysics and epistemology or content and method: there is no absolute a priori; and, from modern metaphysics, abstract and particular objects, possibility and necessity, metaphysics and science, metaphysics and religion and the real nature of science and religion. What has been called (Heidegger) the fundamental problem of metaphysics—Why there is Being—is trivially resolved and replaced by the ever open What has Being. In fact we may say that the problems of metaphysics reduce to the question what has Being (which entails the further concern of description of those things, especially the categories of entity or Being)

A Unique, Ultimate, and Universal Metaphysics

PB is central to the development of this metaphysics which is universal, unique (over the Universe and to within alternative forms and different degrees of detail), and ultimate (explicitly with regard to foundation or depth and implicitly with regard to representation of variety or breadth and extension and duration of Being; the depth foundation is explicitly in the Void; the breadth foundation is implicit because variety is shown to be unlimited but cannot be generated). The development shows the possibility and actuality of metaphysics; and the metaphysics developed is named THE UNIVERSAL METAPHYSICS

Every Individual attains Universal Identity

Every Individual attains Universal Identity. Together with the assertion regarding Universal Identity this constitutes what may be called the PRINCIPLE OF IDENTITY (PI)

Realization is a Journey in Being

Realization of Universal Identity is experienced as a Journey in Being; this is the PRINCIPLE OF REALIZATION (PR). Although realization is given, there are WAYS of realization that improve its efficiency and enhance its meaning (significance) and appreciation. The ways—for us they begin in our world—lie at the intersection of sum of human history and tradition and culture to the present, the metaphysics, and experience; and this includes exploration of experience and transformation of Being. The ways include frameworks for human, social, and individual designs and destinies

Nature of the Journey

Aspects of the nature of the Journey. Attainment of Universal Identity is a process, a journey of becoming without end and without limit to degree or elevation, variety or quality, extension, and duration of Being and summit of attainment. There is no escape from this journey, no final repose in leisure; and the process includes all grades of pleasure and pain. There is no final summit; every attainment is ultimately followed by dissolution

CENTRAL STATEMENTS III

Being and Experience

BEING is what is there. EXPERIENCE is subjective awareness with or without an object; it is the immediate presence of a sentient agent to Being and the primal case of Being. There are Being and experience

BEING is that which is there. It does not follow from this definition that there is Being. EXPERIENCE is subjective awareness with or without an object; it is the immediate presence of a sentient agent to Being and the primal case of Being. It follows from these considerations that there are Being and Experience. Though what we commonly regard as experience is not the only case of Being it is not a violation of the category of experience to think that on some sufficient expansions of its INTENSION and EXTENSION, all Being is experience; and with appropriate expansions we will find this identity to be necessary and fundamental. This basic identity can be viewed as a relabeling and identical to a REAL WORLD inhabited by real sentient organisms and agents. Though experience is not an infallible map of Being, it is at root the only map and REFLEXIVE EXPERIENCE can be improved upon only by reflexive experience (which includes results from instruments). In the METAPHYSICS—the study of Being—to be developed we will find an immense range of perfect knowledge in reflexive experience—this will be PURE METAPHYSICS; a further range that further employs the cumulative tradition, reflexive experience and NON-EPISTEMIC measures (values) of perfection will be labeled APPLIED METAPHYSICS which includes pure metaphysics

The Universe is the Logos

The UNIVERSE which is all Being has no LIMITS. It is always in an experiential state of UNIVERSAL IDENTITY which manifests as states of acute and—at other times—diffuse identity

The UNIVERSE which is all Being has no LIMITS. This is the principle of being (PB). The meaning of PB, which it is crucial to understand, is brought out by the primary alternative form of PB—the LOGOS which is the object of LOGIC is the Universe in all its detail (Logic is defined circularly via the foregoing statement but is understood un-circularly in a demonstration that logic in its classical and modern interpretations and forms are at least approximations to Logic whose scope for development is therefore immense). IDENTITY, the notion and sense of sameness, can be defined objectively (for PERSONAL and OBJECT IDENTITY; a clear notion of an OBJECT is a consequence of the metaphysics—pure in the pure case and ‘applied’ in the applied case; and identity is then part of object-hood). The Universe is always in an experiential state of UNIVERSAL IDENTITY which manifests as states of acute and—at other times—diffuse identity. In the acute states it is the case that the Universe is a single SENTIENT AGENT. It is not clear to our present human form that this case obtains here and now (some persons claim intuition of the case). PB is the cornerstone of a unique, ultimate, and UNIVERSAL METAPHYSICS which may therefore be called the metaphysics and which is UNIQUE in that there cannot be more than one correct pure metaphysics (of course there can be alternate expressions of it and it can be developed to greater and lesser degrees of detail); and it is ULTIMATE in constituting an explicit and absolute foundation for Being and implicit representation of the variety of Being

All Individuals Realize Universal Identity

All INDIVIDUALS REALIZE Universal Identity—i.e., limited identity is (equivalent to) Universal Identity

Realization is a Journey in Being

The realization may be seen as a JOURNEY IN BEING. There are WAYS to realization. An ultimate and unavoidable VALUE is being on the way to realization of universal identity. This does not negate enjoyment of the values of the immediate

The realization may be seen as a JOURNEY IN BEING. This journey is without end. It is experienced and is a journey without limit to the variety, extension, and duration of Being and of which there are summits similarly without limit and without limit in elevation and quality; and every summit is followed by dissolution. Although ultimate realization is guaranteed—equally for the seeker and the satiated slug, it is infinitely enhanced by intelligent application and dedicated search and seeking. There are WAYS to realization. These ways do not guarantee actual outcomes but only that the likelihood of realization is infinitely enhanced. We experience ways as temporary but there must (from PB) be and is a permanent way. The ways do not guarantee nirvana; infinite pleasure and infinite pain are unavoidable. The journey begins in this world and its values. It is obvious that the beginning in this world is a beginning from immense limits. It is not so obvious but it is equally the case that the values of this world are limited. An ultimate and unavoidable VALUE is being on the way to realization of universal identity. This does not negate enjoyment of the values of the immediate

CENTRAL STATEMENTS IV

Being

Being is what is there—what exists

[From the definition it does not follow that something exists—i.e. it does not follow that there is Being]

There is Being

This follows from the definition in a vacuous sense—i.e., if ‘nothing’ counts as ‘something’. However, what is asserted is that there is in fact something there in a non-vacuous sense

There is distinction… and extension and duration

A domain is a realm of phenomena; a spatiotemporal region is a domain

A Law is a pattern of organization andor phenomena in a domain

Laws and domains have Being

The Universe is all Being

All that is there including Laws are in the Universe

The complement of a domain is the part of the Universe that together with the domain constitute the Universe

Existing domains have existing complements

The Void is the complement of the Universe

The Void exists

The Void contains no Being but has Being

The Void contains no Laws

There is no state that does not emerge from the Void

Given any referential concept, there is a corresponding object

E.g., there is an unlimited variety of physical laws and each has all its possible realizations (e.g. cosmoses). Our cosmos has unlimited repetitions. The number of cosmoses is without limit. The variety, extension and duration of the Being is without limit. The Universe has Identity. Individual and Ultimate Identity are identical (in the ultimate). This identity is an unending journey in Being. The individual experiences unlimited variety, extension, and duration of Being; this includes peaks of realization that too have no limit to their ‘elevation’ or variety

Three fundamental objections are (a) internal—e.g. that referential concept such as ‘there is a green field’ and its negation ‘there are no green fields’ cannot both have realization, (b) external—that the Universe, including cosmological systems cannot be other than they are, e.g. science and experience cannot be violated, and (c) intrinsic—that the Void exists

Logic

Objection (a) leads to a definition of Logic as the requirement on the conceptual system for reference. This Logic includes what is valid in the logics and infinitely more. The assertion about concepts may be stated—

STL, the entire conceptual system has reference, or

The object of Logic is the Universe in all its detail, or

The Universe has no limits

This is the Principle of Being (PB)

It could be objected that Universe is limited by Logic. This is not valid for Logic is a constraint on concepts for realism and not a limit on the Universe

Science

Objection (b) includes an apparent violation of science and experience. However the Universe has to be a certain way and this is a contingent fact and not a limit. The laws and behaviors of our cosmos are contingent even though we experience them as limits (and may be called normal but not absolute limits). PB in fact requires the givens of our cosmos and experience. PB agrees with science and experience in their domains of validity

The objection may be formulated: the Universe has limits—it follows some laws but not others

Another objection (d) may now arise and that is that the Universe has limits e.g. it follows some laws and not others. This objection, a repetition of objection (b), is not valid for every cosmos follows some Laws but the entire Universe as a whole follows no Laws

Existential attitude. Doubt

Objection (c) leads to alternate proof but doubt remains. Since PB is inherently without inconsistency, since the arguments for it are at least persuasive, and since it immense in its significance, objection (c) suggest an attitude of FAITH as the attitude that encourages the greatest outcome

Demonstration after all

Perhaps the fundamental demonstration of the existence of the Void is as follows. The Laws apply to things and not to nothingness. Therefore nothingness—the Void—has no Law. Whether it exists or not in a ‘material’ sense it must still, therefore, be equivalent to any state (and PB follows). At least in this sense the existence of the Void is effective. Further it is there: even though it contains no Being it has Being; this usage is not semantically unusual, e.g., in physics a zero force counts as a force, in set theory an (the) empty set is a set, and in mathematics zero is a number

Faith

But faith remains valid as the attitude that encourages the greatest outcome for even though the outcome is guaranteed by PB, PB does not show how and it is here that the interaction of PB and TRADITION is of (great) significance. This interactive ‘discipline’ is Applied Metaphysics in its more limited sense

Objections (a) through (c) are, respectively, concern internal, external, and intrinsic coherence and lead, respectively, to conceptual, empirical, and existential realism. While internal coherence has been labeled conceptual realism or Logic, in an extended sense both conceptual and empirical realism may be labeled Logic and in a further extended sense the three realisms together constitute Logic

Fantasy. Mythic Cosmologies

PB entails that if internal contradictions are removed from the Bible its story must be realized on some cosmos—in fact STL it is realized on an unlimited number of systems. This however gives no support to realization in our cosmos or in any given. Further, such realization is arguably fragile and the Universe is arguably populated mostly with robust systems, e.g. (likely) our cosmos and life in their scientific accounts. Why? Even though transients (e.g. transient particles and cosmoses) may originate more frequently than stable ones, the latter live much longer and population is roughly equal to number originating in unit time multiplied by average or typical age

CENTRAL STATEMENTS V

Being/Experience at the Beginning

Experience is the theater—the play—of human presence, of knowing, of intending and acting and outcome and success and error; Experience-as-we-experience it is the entire drama but not everything—in the language of the theater metaphor there is the physical stage (analogous to the body), there is a director perhaps analogous to less than fully conscious mental process; Being—that which is their—begins as the greatest container of the known and unknown; Tradition (+exp + action + reflection = the way) in middle; world design at end

On the Idea of A Journey in Being

The idea of a journey has origin in (1) A personal search for understanding and becoming. This search explored many avenues and had many transformations; I have experienced it as a journey. (2) A new understanding of the Universe that was demonstrated and developed in the search and which draws inspiration and ideas from the tradition. This understanding reveals the Universe to be without limit in the forms it realizes; named The Universal Metaphysics, the understanding is shown to be unique and may therefore be called the metaphysics. This metaphysics shows that every individual will realize identity with the Universe—i.e., in the ultimate there is one individual—and this realization must be in the form of a journey without end. I call this endless journey a Journey in Being because I used a concept of Being as pivotal in the development of the metaphysics and as a framework for transformation

On Meaning

It is crucial to understand the terms Universe, Being and so on as they are explained and developed in the narrative (see proof below). These meanings. We find that the essential elements of the human endeavor are changed in their (linguistic) meaning

Tradition

In my use, the tradition is the valid portion of the learning of all cultures up to the present time; this includes all our learning including the arts, humanities and science. Naturally all such learning is beyond my ability to acquire and therefore when I refer to the valid portion of the tradition I refer to my best estimate of what I have learned in my life

On Experience

Experience is subjective awareness; there are tendencies (a) to minimize experience (it is ineffectual, trivial, even non-existent) and (b) to assert that experience is everything (idealism, solipsism). However, our experience is real and significant (details in narrative). Whatever is significant, e.g. our knowing-feeling-emoting-intending-action-and-even-our-experience-itself and e.g. the world, finds significance in experience. Although the objects of our experience may lack independent object-hood, experience itself is also an object that does not lack objecthood. In abstracting out the fact of experience it attains perfect objecthood. Therefore, experience may constitute a framework for any further detailed understanding of human psyche (and further, it is here that all understanding achieves significant form). However, our experience is not everything. Is there an expanded meaning in which experience is everything? We find this to be the case but in the limited meaning—our experience—experience is not everything. In the theater metaphor there are the players behind the scene, the director perhaps analogous to the idea of the subconscious and the physical theater which is perhaps analogous to any material underpinning to experience. Whatever is not experience is in Being

Fundamental Proof of the Metaphysics

Being is what is there somewhere and somewhen—i.e. over some range of times and places. ‘That which is there’ is a locution for ‘exists’; the concept of existence has been associated with certain problems which are resolved in the details of the narrative. A law is our reading of a pattern; a Law is the pattern. All Laws have Being. The Universe is All Being—everywhere and everywhen, i.e. over all extension and duration. The Universe contains all Laws. A domain is a realm of phenomena; a range over some times and some places is a domain; the complement of a domain is the part that together with the domain constitute the Universe. If a domain exists it has a complement which exists. The complement of the Universe exists; it contains no Being and no Law; I call it the Void (i.e. the Void which exists has no Being and, in particular, no Laws). If there is a possible state that does not emerge from the Void, that non-emergence would constitute a Law of the Void. Therefore every possible state emerges and exists. This concludes the essentials of proof but clarification and power of the principle is enhanced finding an effectively applicable form. This now follows. A Logical form of the Principle of Being. The word possible should be made precise. States that do not violate logic (i.e. whose descriptions) are possible and therefore allowed; other states are not. However, the logics are limited and imperfect. Therefore define Logic as the requirement on descriptions or concepts for realization; Logic is not empty for the logics approximate; but Logic outside of the logics is vast and intricate without end. Is Logic a limit? It is not for it is a constraint on our descriptions that rules out such things as contradictions; Logic applies to descriptions (propositions etc.); the Universe is in a distinct category from the domain of application of Logic; here there is unending potential for development. Note that logic as deduction falls out of this conception by consideration of constraints on collections of propositions. Also note that Logic requires the valid portions of science: the logics allow the world to be other than it is; but Logic cannot—and does not; givens are required by Logic: what is valid in the tradition (including the valid portions of science) are required by Logic. It might seem that Logic violates the limits of science but it does not for science simply says this is the way the cosmos is and not this is the way the Universe must be

Observation Regarding Experience

What is experience? When I experience (e.g. see) something directly that thing affects me. Experience is—the effect of—interaction (in pure experience there is internal interaction that may involve a trace of earlier interaction—memory—or may be the effect of spontaneous process—formless and apparent sensation—or combination—imagination or hallucination). The interactions are among first order elements of Being (what we may call matter). Then, experience is second order Being. If matter is a category or substance, experience must be already present in the elements but our experience is the result of differentiation, organization, and layering which results in focus, form, acuity, and kinds such as feeling and sensation). Thus we do not need an expanded sense of experience but only that it has more universal reference. Now, in our world we tend to think of matter and mind as categories and this includes that they are categorially distinct; matter therefore has nothing in the category of mind or experience. Therefore, experience / mind must be the result of some infusion or organization. Infusion is ruled out by category for since they are distinct mind if infused could not attach itself to matter. However, organization could perhaps robotically simulate animals and humans but the presence of experience remains categorially inexplicable. Therefore we must rule out the categorial divide. Then matter and mind are either coeval or there is infusion. On the metaphysical universality of interaction, however, the distinction between the coeval and fusion options is moot. Monism, dualism, functionalism are all invalid. Our form of organization is the result of adaptation in which we are grounded at every layer of organization; it is this that is adapted; and the organization has two sides: first and second order—material and experiential that are not distinct; thus experience goes beyond adaptation it is integral to Being and it is the forms of experience (sensory modes, feeling, free imaging and symbol, seemingly unconscious processing that is in fact not unconscious but not close enough to center to be experienced as central consciousness) that are adaptations

The Principle of Being

The Universe has no limits—i.e., what is Logically possible is actual; i.e. the Universe is the object of Logic; e.g., the Universe could not be greater than it is; e.g., there are cosmological systems without limit to number and variety; e.g., the variety of physical law in the Universe is without limit and each law is realized without limit and this system of cosmological systems may be seen as arising in transients from the Void; e.g. the Universe has manifest and non-manifest phases; e.g. except for conditions of co-existence, every Individual inherits the limitlessness of the Universe. The meaning of ‘limit’ which it is crucial to understand will be clarified later; this may appear to violate science and reason—and reasonable common sense—and vice-versa but it does not and in fact it requires what is valid in science etc.

Meaning of the Principle of Being

The meaning of the principle lies in its statement and only in its statement. A form of the statement is that the Universe is the object of Logic, i.e. what is allowed by Logic. It is crucial that this entails that the Universe is not the cosmos of science, specifically that the Universe contains the what is valid in that cosmos but infinitely more (e.g., as described in the previous paragraph). It is essential to see how this is necessitated; this lies in the proof of the principle (and in the meanings of the concepts used in the proof). It is also essential to see how this does not place the principle in conflict with science and experience and this is brought out in what follows. It should take time to understand and assimilate the new world view that is entailed by the principle and how this world view is in harmony with the valid parts of the older world views. A crucial aspect of the meaning of the principle concerns the term ‘no limits’. That the Universe is without limit may be assumed to mean that the Universe is infinite in extent. That is not its meaning. First, the principle concerns much more than spatial extent but also includes duration and variety. Second, it does not mean that the Universe is infinite but that it will sometimes be infinite, sometimes finite but non-zero and other times zero in size; and any other case would constitute a limit. The meaning of the principle is understood in terms of its sense which is brought by its proof and better appreciated in its entailments (above and below)

The Significance of the Principle of Being

The significance of the principle begins with its meaning and is brought out in terms of its consequences. Consequences may be classed as (a) academic and (b) human. I use this distinction in detailing consequences even though it is not at all absolute

An Outline of Consequences of the Principle of Being

The consequences are (a) academic and (b) human. It is out of convenience though not importance that I list the academic first

Academic Consequences

Metaphysics

Metaphysics is knowledge of Being as it is; it does not follow from this definition that there is a metaphysics; however, if there is metaphysical knowledge of the Universe it must be unique (but can be developed to different degrees of detail and have different forms of expression). The fact and possibility of metaphysics have often been doubted. However, the demonstrated Principle of Being is developed as a Universal Metaphysics in which the essential classical and many modern problems of metaphysics dissolve. It is seen for example that there is no substance or need for substance; Being has foundation in Void: since every state emerges from the Void this constitutes foundation

Logic

We have seen that the principle results in a new and potent conception of Logic

Cosmology

The principle engines a Cosmology that goes far beyond modern physical cosmology; this general cosmology is developed as a methodology, a theory of variety, a theory of space-time-Being, a resolution and understanding of mind and matter, of identity and its transformations and its preservations over singularities in space-time

Theory of Objects

It also engines a Theory of Objects which founds and unifies our understanding of particular and abstract objects; i.e. abstract objects are not distinct from the particular and, e.g., they are not atemporal but, rather, their abstraction (for the atemporal abstract) does not ‘import’ temporality. There are also implications for the sciences, arts and humanities; these remain—mostly—at a general level (in the humanities and the study of mind there are detailed consequences)

Method

On Method—the following methodological principles are implicit in the foregoing

Formal Method: Abstraction

Formal method—an abstraction out of distortable detail is implicit in the definition of Being; this abstraction founds the ideas of Being, Law, Universe, and even Logic as conceived here; thus method and content, epistemology and metaphysics, arise simultaneously (because knowledge is in the world, method is content) and method is not a priori to content: method and content arise from experience

Formal Method: Analysis of Meaning

Another element of formal method is analysis of meaning which already incorporates the empirical

Informal Method: Neutrality and Emergence

Informal method: the neutrality of Being allows the fact or otherwise of categories and any actual categories to emerge

Informal Method: Reflexivity

Reflexivity is a general aspect of informal method; vertical reflex is exemplified by interaction of method and content; horizontal reflex by interactions among content and kinds of content, e.g. suggestions of science for metaphysics, e.g. the interpenetration of creation and criticism (which show limits to certainty of direct knowledge and separation of discovery and justification)

Science

Science—the metaphysics envelopes both quantum and relativistic mechanics and this may prove fruitful for interaction and mutual development; evolutionary theory is immensely suggestive in applying the metaphysics and the metaphysics suggests that alternate modes of Being exist in other cosmological systems

Humanities

Humanities—there are clearly immense philosophical implications; and the intersection with history is significant

Art

Art—the principle says: there is no fiction (except for violation of Logic)

Understanding Human Being

Understanding Human Being, i.e. being human. We observed that experience is the human theater. The fact is near formless

Categories of Intuition: Existential, Natural, Social, Of Psyche

It is given form in terms of the categories of intuition—Existential (includes Being, experience, humor as the ability to deal with essential contradiction), Natural (physical includes form and indeterminism, and living), Social, and of Psyche (includes concept-percept-feeling and symbol)

Human Consequences

Human Endeavor and Destiny

There are consequences for the human endeavor and destiny; in outline these are brought out by the principle of identity and description of a journey in Being below

Evolution of Science

There are many other human consequences that lie at the intersection of the metaphysics and the tradition. An example is that while the present way of science will remain valid it must grow to include participation and immersion in interaction with the present empirical / hypothetico-deductive way

Religion

Finally—Religion. Although the human psyche is or appears to be wedded to a mold of religion (thus even today the immensity of the feeling for and against), the metaphysics reveals an altogether new notion of religion… Religion as the deployment of all dimensions of Being (the Being of the individual and group) in the realization of universal Being; the metaphysics reveals this as possible and necessary; and it shows the convergence of this meaning with the new meaning of science

Religion

See the following for an understanding of a new concept of religion. It is crucial that there are no guarantees of realization in our present forms; and the realization will sometimes be nirvana and sometimes not but again there is never in any particular situation a guarantee of nirvana or of not. It is crucial that there is no sin in the old meaning of sin. And it is crucial that there is pain. Pain is not sought but the journey gives it meaning even though there is no guarantee in every instance. Effort—intelligent application—is essential to resolution and realization. Given this the promise is infinitely greater than that of the great religions and mythologies; and, equally, the challenge is infinitely greater and it rests on our shoulders and not on dependence on church or priest or god. Older ideas of what is religion and older approaches to study of religions are defunct; all study of any kind that, regardless of local and piecemeal imperative, that does not account for other local and piecemeal imperatives is defunct and what is the inclusion of a range of imperatives if it is not system?

The Principle of Identity

The Universe has Identity which goes through acute and diffuse phases; every Individual acquires or realizes this Universal Identity

A Journey in Being

Universal realization is given; it is an endless process with no limit to the extension, duration, magnitude and variety of forms and peaks realized (every peak is followed by dissolution; while this is given, its occurrence is not given to any individual in an instantiation and its occurrence is made far more enjoyable and frequent by attempt and application. The journey gives rise to new conceptions of religion and science: they fall within the following conception of Religion as the deployment of all dimensions of Being in the knowing and realizing of All Being

The Way

The Way is framed by the Principle of Being and its consequent metaphysics; it begins in every present moment whose enjoyment is important; ideas are necessary but not sufficient without their working out in experiments in transformation; sources for such experiments are found in the traditions of transformation and their frameworks; there is a dynamic of interaction among the foregoing elements, experienced, and reflection in continued iteration; for an individual the dynamic itself becomes an element and may be cultivated so that it acquires some degree of system; and, finally, a minimal and covering system of experiments may be formulated and these constitute a dynamic program for a journey of transformation (the program and the elements of the process remain open to change)

CAPITAL STATEMENTS VI

1.0—Realism

Metaphysical Realism

Therefore; Universe has Identity; phases of acute, diffuse, and non-identity and Being; individual and universal identity are the same

2.0—Derivation, Consequences

Derivation

Consequences: Human, Ideas; Destiny, Journey

1.0—Journey

The Journey of Being / Identity is one of unlimited variety in identity, being, extension, and duration (implies manifest and unmanifest phases, phases of acute and diffuse and non-identity; implies continuity through 'non' phases: soul)

1.0—Ways

Dynamics, Tradition, Experience; Ways, Catalysts; So Far, Future

NOTES

1 The word ‘Idea’ is used in a generic sense to cover ideas, thought, concepts, and conceptual systems

Here, Capitalization is used—for terms not normally capitalized—to distinguish use in the narrative from other uses (and when such terms are not capitalized reference is to other use which may be either formal or informal)

Unless otherwise specified, the word ‘here’ shall generally mean ‘in this work’, ‘narrative’ refers to the discursive parts of the work, and ‘main narrative’ refers to the chapters that follow the Introduction

2 The word ‘concept’ has a number of uses. One use of ‘concept’ is as a ‘unit of meaning’. Examples from everyday life are contentment, hope, desire, and destiny. Examples from physics are force, mass, distance, and time. From biology we may cite the concepts of species, natural selection, organism, and epigenetics. Compound concepts may be built up from others and so the idea of unit of meaning is relative. It is not at all clear that there are elements or atoms of meaning

There is another use of the word ‘concept’ in which it refers to any mental content (usually conscious but the point is not yet too important since we have not yet analyzed the distinction between it and the unconscious and whether the discontinuity is that of white versus black or white versus cream and or grey). This is the typical use of concept in this narrative and I will therefore capitalize this use: a Concept is any mental content

It follows that percepts and concepts are Concepts but not the only ones. A pure Experience is a concept. A memory may be a concept; however, I will not think of a dormant or non-activated memory as a Concept: these are perhaps potential Concepts. However, when memories come into consciousness (or even active unconscious if that idea should turn out to have meaning) they are then Conceptual

A Concept (perceptual or conceptual in nature) that is in the form of a reference to the world is called referential (here). Not all referential Concepts refer; a better term therefore may be potentially referential; however by referential I mean ‘referential in nature’ and not ‘referential in fact’

3 Some comments on meaning are appropriate and opportune if a little premature

In this narrative Meaning will refer to linguistic meaning: the meanings of words, sentences and so on and other utterances (or scribbles). The analysts (i.e., the analytic philosophers) have found that some utterances have no reference: to what does the expression of pain ‘ouch’ or an angry scribble that tears at the paper or destroys the computer screen refer? I should say at outset that such analyses have value but I am opposed to any assertion that there is no reference because there may be deeper or implicit levels at which there is reference: analysis should perhaps never rest

However, the main concern in this narrative is referential linguistic meaning. You will find that that is the main use of linguistic meaning in this narrative. This of course is no suggestion that feeling and emotion and passion are irrelevant. Every moment is imbued with feeling; it is a kind of compass that is part of keeping us on the right track so that we remain real even while in flights of rare fantasy. Feeling and emotion binds us to others and the world but also motivates us into fantasy and its analysis so that we may explore new realms of the real. And passion drives us and is a nectar of life

Back, however, to linguistic meaning. We omit from consideration the whole issue of para-linguistic meaning (gestures, tone of voice, large and heavy letters and so on). Everything is important but if we admit everything we are likely to get bogged down (like the whole analytic enterprise) and in any case we will find that we can make immense sense as of simple formal (but not too formal) linguistic meaning and further, that this sense will imbue our developments (and, I hope the reader’s understanding) with immense power

In Conceptual Meaning a Concept refers to an object

The non-object is the case of pure Experience, e.g. stream of consciousness (Experience is defined later). This case is important because it includes imagination and construction that may be applied and tested for contingent / necessary later reference

We have seen that units of Meaning are relative. Therefore Meaning depends on (linguistic) context: whether the word stands alone or is in a sentence as well as world context (obviously). We will find a metaphysics that defines a context that is ultimate in some senses. This does not invalidate other contexts but provides a framework, perhaps potential, for them

What determines Meaning? A dictionary? An Expert? To some extent. However, dictionaries and experts are not outside the world. Every term in a dictionary refers to another term. Therefore to stabilize meaning we have to come back (Wittgenstein) to use, to the milieu, to the world. There is no outside to the world

Contexts are changeable. Meanings fluctuate. There is a balance between stability and fluidity. Sometimes we must be open to meaning, sometimes we must insist, and at yet other times we may equivocate

The main narrative expands on the foregoing considerations and, from the metaphysics there developed and other considerations, improves upon them

Also I may eliminate the above comments on analysts etc. of at least make apologies and offers of eternal friendship

4 Here, Being is defined to be whatever Exists or has Existence. It is therefore ultimate in neutrality; it is for example neutral with regard to kind or substance and with regard to entity or process or interaction. Whatever is—has Being; whatever is not has not Being. This combination of neutrality and definiteness is pivotal to the significance of Being as conceived here

In common use, ‘Exists’ refers to some range of space at roughly the present instant. Here the meaning of Exists is extended to refer to some Domain as defined below; this definition allows that ‘Exists’ may refer to a single point in time and or space

Clearly, there is Being. If, for example, I think ‘there is nothing’, all is illusion then there is at least illusion: illusion or illusions Exist. While correct this is not a very pleasing proof of the ‘Being of Being’ for it allows that Being might be very ethereal or flimsy. The development in the main narrative provides a demonstration of the nature of Being as real and robust (and a clarification of the meaning of the terms ‘real’ and ‘robust’)

One way of seeing the power of the idea of Being in relation to its neutrality and emergence is via a comparison to the power of elementary algebra. Simple algebraic processes involving unknown quantities were formidable and clumsy before the idea of introducing a simple symbol, e.g. x, for an unknown quantity. Problems that would have been difficult now become trivial. At the outset of solving an equation the value of x is unknown. However we work with the equation to turn the implicit conditions on x into an explicit result (numerical or in terms of other quantities). The case of Being is similar. It stands, among other things, for the metaphysical unknowns. Is the world material or psychic or both or neither; does involve one or many substances or no substances at all; and are the fundamental elements things, processes, interactions, qualities… and are they wholes or parts… and are there any unlimited wholes and any indivisible parts? The entire range of options and, further, the question of what are the options is left open at outset and this lends definiteness of a kind, eliminates vagueness, allows the actual case to emerge, and when it does then if it should turn out that the world is, say, material then the case for the outcome is strengthened and consolidated relative to the mere assumption of the case from reigning and successful but still contingent paradigms (e.g. materialism)

5 The Concepts of Being and Existence and other terms above are well known to not be unproblematic; such problems are addressed in the main narrative

One concern, that it will be useful to mention at this point, is that such terms have had a variety of uses and senses. The significance of the present conceptions is not that they eliminate or are for all purposes superior to all others; rather it is that these conceptions have been chosen to and will be seen to constitute an articulated world view or metaphysics. (This metaphysics will be called the Universal Metaphysics. It will be shown to be essentially unique and so may be called, simply, the metaphysics.) Where, however, the present metaphysics exceeds and contains others, its system of meaning will be superior to those of other systems; and if, as will be shown, the present system is ultimate (in some sense or senses), its system of meaning will be correspondingly ultimate; and, further, if other tentative metaphysics are thereby or otherwise invalidated, their systems of meaning will be correspondingly invalid

It is therefore important to be aware of and keep in mind the uses (definitions) here

6 A Domain is the Universe or part of it, i.e. some range of extension and duration—i.e., roughly some range of space and time (note that a range may be a collection of connected ranges). In the main narrative the sense of the term ‘Domain’ will be enhanced to include that of the phenomenal domain which includes kinds and or ranges of phenomena including ranges of extension and duration

If we regard the Universe as part of itself, the definition of Domain may be simplified to ‘A Domain is any part of the Universe’

A collection of Domains mark a part of the Universe which is, therefore, also a Domain. The complement of a Domain is the part of the Universe that is not part of the Domain. Given a Domain it has a complement (that Exists). A Domain and its complement constitute the Universe

7 The Universe is defined to be All Being (over all extension and duration, i.e. roughly over all space and time). Anything that has Being is in the Universe. There is nothing outside the Universe. This definiteness is pivotal to the significance of ‘Universe’ as conceived here

Since there is Being, the Universe Exists

The term ‘universe’ has had a number of uses. One modern use is that the universe is the known physical cosmos. Modern physical cosmology allows that there may be many cosmological systems. Such systems would all be part of the Universe. There may be multiple cosmoses and more, e.g. transients and backgrounds, and there may be parallel cosmoses or universes but these would all be part of the one Universe. This will here lead to clarity of thought

Here are further primitive examples of the power of the present conceptions of Being and Universe

Ask what is the nature of the concept of ‘possibility’. Any context is defined in terms of its constitution and its occasions: its constitution is what it is and its occasions are the states in which it finds itself. If it is in some state A, then A is obviously possible. If we conceive a state B which has not been observed then B is possible if its occurrence is allowed by the constitution of the context. Consider physical possibility: for definiteness, the context may be taken to be Earth under the known laws of physics. It is possible for human being to high jump 8 feet (the world record as of this writing is 2.45m or 8 feet and 0.5 inches is held by Javier Sotomayor of Cuba set in 1993) but physically impossible for a human to escape Earth’s gravity by jumping (the force required to escape Earth’s gravity by jumping would far exceed human muscle and bone strength). Under what circumstances would escape from gravity be possible? For humans to be able to escape Earth’s gravity by jumping, there would have to be another context, e.g. stronger humans, weaker gravity, another set of physical laws etc. Now consider the concept of possibility in relation to the Universe; we may call this absolute possibility. If a state A occurs it is obviously possible. If a state B never occurs, is it possible? Its occurrence would require another context. But the ‘context’ is the Universe so there is no other context. I.e., the state B is impossible. In summary, relative to the Universe, a state that occurs is possible and a state that never occurs is impossible: for the Universe occurrence and possibility, i.e. actuality and possibility, are identical

Ask what is the nature of such things as concepts, ideas, and abstract objects. Some idealist thinkers hold that such things exist in an ideal world (Plato is perhaps the greatest example of an idealist in this sense of the word ‘ideal’). A variation on this idealism is that there are three ‘worlds’: ideal or Platonic, material, and mental. Obviously much vagueness and indefiniteness attends to such conceptions. Here, however, of all things that we can conceive and name: ideas, abstract objects, concrete entities, processes, interactions and so on, there are two alternatives: they have Being or they are fictions. If they have Being they are in the Universe and otherwise not. In other words, some of our conceptions name things that have Being while others—the fictions—do not. The power of our conceptions of Being and Universe is that we are not presented with an initial vagueness of our concepts; and that we are not required or compelled to attend to the distinctions implied by the terms ‘material’ ‘idea’ ‘abstract’. There may be practical problems of kinds of objects and these may or may not turn out to be of significance. However, these will not turn out to be pivotal to the developments here and further the developments will make clear the nature of the kinds. I.e., while we are not compelled to attend to the distinctions, we may do so and the developments will enable us to incisively attend to them

8 What is a Law? Let us begin by considering the non-capitalized term ‘law’, i.e. the idea of law in its usual sense. An example of a physical law is Newton’s Law of Gravitation; under laws we will include valid physical theories such as Newtonian Mechanics which, though superseded by modern physical theories—relativistic and quantum—has domains of validity; however we exclude things such as law in the legal sense. We may wonder whether there are domains of validity for Newtonian Mechanics: is it not, even in appropriate domains, merely an excellent approximation? No, for in the appropriate domains we can relax precision so that Newtonian Mechanics is satisfied exactly in the domains while still having descriptive, predictive, and explanatory power (practically, being an excellent approximation is validity)

We can now distinguish Laws from laws: while a law is our reading of a pattern the Law is the pattern itself

Is a Law ‘real’ in itself? The question is not ‘is it precise’ or ‘is it universal’ but, rather, does it have Being? Since the Law is in the Universe it necessarily has Being and this can be seen intuitively as well in that the Law is a pattern. Incidentally laws have Being as well and this is brought in some versions of the main narrative (the Being of laws is of a different order than that of Laws: Laws have Being in the Universe or cosmos at large; laws have Being in minds, theories, cultures… the distinction is not essential for everything is in the Universe)

9 That there is and can be only One Universe follows from the definitions of Universe (and Being)

10 The Universe is the greatest (possible)—Precisely what is the meaning of this assertion and how is it known to be true? Its truth is demonstrated in the below (briefly and incompletely here, and fully in the main narrative). Meaning and demonstration are briefly indicated in these notes and are treated more completely in the main narrative

That the Universe is the greatest includes that anything that could obtain does obtain (it may be necessary that some things that obtain do so in some Domain)

Although full demonstration is left to the main narrative a brief demonstration is given below

11 That the Universe is the Greatest is equivalent to the assertion that the Universe has no limits (it is essential to be careful about the meaning of limits). That our cosmos is in some particular configuration, that it is infinite or finite, and that it has certain laws are or may be considered to be limits; however they are contingent and or physical limits. The meaning of limit, here, is not something that obtains (i.e. finiteness and laws are irrelevant to this meaning) but something that could not obtain. I.e. the meaning of ‘limitless’ is, simply, that anything that could obtain, i.e. anything that is possible, does so

It is important to ask what sense of the term ‘possible’ has in this use. Is it physical possibility? No, for physical possibility is a Limit: in physical possibility behavior does not violate physical Law. What kind of possibility is non Limiting? The only kind is logical possibility for logical impossibility is not a Limit on the Universe but is a constraint on concepts that results from the freedom to imagine things such as contradictions. This point will be taken up again later

Note that contingent limits, which may be called Normal Limits, may be immensely difficult for denizens of a cosmos to supersede. However, that the Universe is limitless implies that such supersedence is possible and necessarily occurs (if not in this cosmos then in other identical and similar cosmoses)

Even so, the idea of Limitlessness may seem remote and vague. However, its real character is that it is implicit. Its conceptually explicit character is brought in the later note on Realism and examples will reinforce and show how to use (‘compute with’) Realism

Demonstration in the main narrative has a number of grounding preliminaries. These include the logical, i.e. showing that the fundamental concepts (e.g. Being) are named givens; and existential, e.g. tying Being into human Experience. In what follows the preliminaries, niceties and details of demonstration are omitted. A bare skeleton of demonstration is as follows in the note on the Void

12 The Void is the absence of Being (more precisely it is the / a Domain contains no Being)

The Universe contains All Being; its complement therefore contains no Being; therefore the complement of the Universe is the Void. Since the complement of any Domain Exists, the Void Exists

PB can now be proved as follows. Since Laws have Being, the Void has no Laws. If from the Void, some state could not emerge then that (non-emergence) would be a Law in the Void. Therefore all states emerge from the Void. I.e., every state that could obtain does obtain (in some Domain). I.e., the Universe has no Limits in the sense that what is possible obtains

13 The Principle of Being (PB) is the central statement of The Universal Metaphysics or the metaphysics and the demonstration above is essentially a demonstration of the metaphysics (the phrase ‘the metaphysics’ will be reserved for this use but will not invariably be italicized)

The consequences of PB are immense. Here is a sample

For results, the proof from limitlessness is often trivial (in discussing Logic, later, we will see that there is an immense realm of non-trivial consequences awaiting discovery and experience). E.g., given that our cosmos has certain physical laws, that the Universe must exceed it in variety of law and kinds of Being is trivial. Further, there are an unlimited variety of other cosmoses, some identical, some similar to, and others vastly different from our cosmos. The different cosmoses include those with vastly different behaviors and laws. And these must stand against a background of Being in manifest and non-manifest and stable and transient phases. For example, while origins of cosmological systems and their stable evolution are likely to follow some (e.g. evolutionary mechanism), such mechanisms are not at all necessary. If we label the case of mechanism ‘Normal’ we expect most (if not all) cosmological systems to be Normal and escape from their contingent behavior to be Normally immensely difficult and unlikely

Other results are

If in this cosmos there is a myth that could be satisfied, there is a cosmos in which it will be satisfied

There are no ultimate atoms. Every atom is a cosmos; every cosmos an atom

There are ghost cosmological systems passing through ours at the present instant

Every cosmological system, every individual, has an identical (and other) and immediately present ghost which must have interactions but may be so small as to pass detection or so have its interactions to be so integrated as to appear as laws and or boundary conditions

The form of every individual occurs with limitless repetition on other cosmological systems (separated from ours by stretches of extension and duration). This apparently has no significance if two forms of the individual share no consciousness or if history is merely repeated. However, while history is often repeated it is immensely often different (which includes similarity). Also I do not consciously experience other forms; however PB requires, first, some form of relation among experiences as well as higher forms that integrate the lower

Limitlessness is conferred on every individual and every part of the Universe except of course, in the case of finite or otherwise limited forms, for conditions of coexistence. However PB requires that limited forms will be transcended and individuals will realize the Universe (call it perhaps ‘universal being’). For the finite or otherwise limited form realization will be an endless process (journey)

In this cosmos we know one example of life: life on Earth. There are other instances, infinitely many of them. It is reasonable but not necessary that the mechanisms of origin and growth of these forms be evolutionary (therefore even if occurrence is sparse there will be origins without mechanism)

While these and many other results are trivial consequences of PB, they are somewhat puzzling. Not only do they appear to contradict common knowledge, experience, and science, they even suggest logical contradiction. Such concerns are taken up shortly. It will be seen that while ‘proofs’ are trivial, interpreting them and squaring them with common knowledge etc. is not trivial and is important

Some further comments on the Void are now possible

The modern literature has asked ‘How many Voids are there?’ (E.g. see http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/nothingness/). The range of answers could be 0, 1, … , a finite number, … , some degree of infinity, … , and, finally, Voids without Limit. Here we see that the Void Exists. Therefore there is at least one (perhaps we could consider one and zero to, in the nature of the Void, to be equivalent). If there is one, then equivalently there may be many. The number of Voids—one or many—has little relevance. The Void may be thought of as the ‘Universal Generator’, creating and annihilating cosmoses. Every element of Being may be thought of as having its own Void. Once PB is demonstrated, the Void loses its importance for PB shows that the Void is equivalent to any state. I.e., every state is equivalent to every other.

14 On Doubt and Metaphysics. At this point a variety of doubts may have arisen. Shortly below I take up these doubts. At this point it will be useful to enquire into the significance of doubt itself. The idea of doubt played an important role in the growth of knowledge and reason and was a key feature of the thought of René Descartes. What follows now is an analysis of the significance of doubt

In acquiring knowledge and understanding there is often an initial excitement at simply knowing about our world. This is the beginning of a story that is true for individuals and civilizations and that has probably repeated at a number of levels. The excitement of knowing gives rise to a desire for certainty, perhaps via acquaintance with error or perhaps as an extension of the initial excitement (this is of course partial and tentative ‘reconstruction’). The excitement of certainty gives rise to an excitement regarding doubt and criticism. Doubt is dual to certainty: the more we care about certainty, the more we have concern (excitement or worry) with doubt. A first function of doubt is to be certain, to be secure in knowing. Different degrees of doubt are appropriate in different situations. In general human affairs and in science it is essential to tolerate some degree of uncertainty; without this there might be no action, no progress. In metaphysics, which will here be defined as knowledge of being as such, uncertainty is generally not tolerated: metaphysics stands behind science, some field must have this function, and metaphysics is the name of the endeavor that has or intersects this function. This notion of metaphysics however led to the thought that gained strength with the philosophers David Hume and Immanuel Kant that metaphysics is impossible; Hume’s argument was that generalization as in science is always contingent; Kant’s argument was that we invariably bring projection to our knowing (which would remain even if we were able to eliminate all instrumental error). Thus, since the time of Kant metaphysics as I define it has fallen into varying degrees of disrepute or has been conceived as some other kind of activity, e.g. the study of experience or the science of abstract objects or ideas

Doubt has a second and related function and that is the clarification of ideas including criticism. Already we have seen from simple considerations (in principle a kind of abstraction so that what remains is beyond distortions of measure and projection) that there is Being and Universe and from these some remarkable conclusions have emerged. We have noted the facts of Being and Universe, have deduced a remarkable consideration on the nature of possibility, and seen some remarkable metaphysical / cosmological considerations emerge (and much more will follow below and in the main narrative). Thus doubt has clarified the nature and some limits of criticism (in the development of these ideas doubts about the validity and function of materialism and substance led to the importance and present conception of Being, doubts about the Universe as entirely physical led to the present conception which is not anti-material but is neutral on that issue). In other words doubt has clarified particular concepts as well as the nature of the constructive and critical enterprise. In the first stage there was the excitement of knowing; we declared ‘I know’. This was followed by the excitement of criticism: we declared ‘I do not know’ (and I must find, as in recent philosophy, a different function for the activity of philosophy). This, it is now seen, is followed by a third stage, in which doubt meets knowing and the two interpenetrate each other with the result that we find areas of perfect knowing (e.g. metaphysics) and areas of practical but imperfect knowing (science). Of course there are vast areas of ignorance but these, we will see, are framed by the metaphysics and their penetration begins with science and (as we will see) experiments in transformation in Being

One aspect of the bleakness of angry and stern but ego-centered and often depressed critics is the whitewash of the distinction between knowledge of and knowledge that (and more generally of many epistemic and more general distinctions of which some will be mentioned and addressed below). Knowledge of is knowledge that is direct or a fairly clear inference. Knowledge that is that of which we know regardless of how. The metaphysics is a mix of the ‘of’ and the ‘that’ but in the case of the ‘that’ we have established the how and found that it is a closet form of the ‘of’. Our Experience has already in it the mark of the empirical

In the following notes we will see doubt in action in relation to validating and clarifying the metaphysics

15 One source of the present considerations on Realism is doubt regarding PB. A number of doubts arise. (1) Doubt regarding the demonstration of PB. The doubt concerns validity of the proof and amounts to a concern over the nature and existence of the Void. This doubt is important for concerns with truth and with the appearance that so much is derived from so little (the base of derivation is not so little after all for while demonstration is simple the development of the groundwork was not; however this does not remove the concern) (2) Doubts regarding consequences of the principle that appear to stand in contradiction to experience which includes common experience and modern science and its principles (3) Doubts that the consequences of the principle may contradict one another. The narrative addresses many doubts and concerns. However these doubts are the most fundamental. They may be named (1) Existential—Concern with truth and what attitude to in face of not having truth (2) External or Extrinsic—Concern with the empirical character of PB (and therefore with the metaphysics), and (3) Internal or Intrinsic—Concern with issues such as internal and conceptual coherence including but not limited to consistency. We now consider these doubts. Our objectives are to address the doubts as best we can and to use them as learning and clarifying tools. We will find that they are more than just clarifying: they lead to marked improvements of some concepts of general significance as well as of significance in the present development

16 The term ‘experience’ has many uses. However here Experience shall first mean subjective experience. Its meaning is close to that of consciousness and awareness

Examples of Experience are the feeling of the brilliance of a sunset and the fragrance of a rose; and the stench of a raw sewer. However, Experience is not limited to simple feeling. When we remember we have Experience (it is not the original Experience but it is Experience nonetheless). In thinking we are having forms of thought built of remembered traces that we Experience now (perhaps enhanced by random elements that nonetheless result in Experience)

The human significance of Experience is that while it is not everything, it is the theater of our being (in some versions of the main narrative it is seen that Experience is, if not everything, then associated with everything). Without it there might as well be nothing; we might as well be zombies or robots that have nothing but mechanical behavior but no inner life. The human significance gives also significance to the use of Experience in relation to metaphysics

In addition to its human significance, Experience has formal metaphysical significance. As human I Experience (my) Experience. Although the object of my Experience may be distorted via measure and projection, the fact that I Experience, a fact beyond distortion (for if it is illusion it is still Experience) is given and objective

In the main narrative we develop the fact, and robustness of Experience, and the fact that it refers in part to a real and varied world

Although its explicit role right here is minor, its role in the main narrative is that it is a container for what is significant to human (and other sentient) beings

17 Truth. Reasons for doubt of the proof of PB are given above. In some versions of the main narrative alternate proofs are given, some demonstrative (deductive but as in the present case based in named given premises) and others plausible and whose function is to assuage doubt (since it is not at all clear that proof of PB is lacking in valid deduction this is important). (An interesting example of a heuristic argument is to apply Ockham’s Razor (the principle that hypotheses should be minimal) to what is not in the Universe.) However, doubt remains regarding the Existence of the Void: although the complement of any sub-part of the Universe clearly Exists, it is not so clear that the complement of the Universe (nothing) Exists even though the proof is formally correct. What may we do in this situation? Note, first, that while the principle appears to violate science and common sense and possibly logic these concerns are addressed below. Therefore we are left with a metaphysics with demonstration but some doubts about the proof and which is consistent with science and logical principle and which, further, goes immensely beyond science in revealing the Limitless character of the Universe and in revealing the ultimate identity (as seen below) of individual and Universe. Shall we abandon this idea because of lack of certainty regarding proof? There are parallels in mathematics were certain axioms are admitted because of their near but not absolute obviousness and the power of their implications. It should be added that the very possibility of absolute certainty is not given (main narrative, literature) and therefore we have no option but either inaction or high action based on some degree of certainty (but not on absurdity). The greatest outcome is likely if we base some degree of resources and action on PB (or, in mathematics, the near certain axioms)

Given that PB is not contradictory and not absurd, what would be a reasonable course of attitude if we had no proof of it, just as there was no proof (at least in the minds of explorers) of earth’s roundness as they set out thinking that they might fall off the edge of the earth. Not doubt there is and will be hesitation and some fear; however, provided that we think of faith as the attitude that maximizes outcomes

However, we do have proof of PB but we now see that it may even be a virtue that we are not certain about PB. If our attitude to realization is that we are on an endless journey then while we know the end we do not know the way. Not knowing of the end simply adds to existential challenge. Faith is an existential response to incomplete knowledge, realization, and limited certainty about truth and destiny (and is not in the least about believing in limited or absurd propositions)

Our considerations have led us to rediscover the importance of process (the metaphysics suggests that all discovery is rediscovery); and we are lead again to the ideas of Truth as understanding and attitude as much as knowledge (whether as correspondence to facts, as coherence among concepts, or as some utilitarian measure)

18 Science. A picture of the cosmos from physical science is the big-bang picture. In some scenarios this is supplemented by a multi-cosmos picture, e.g. cosmoses that come into existence (e.g. in the implosion of a black hole) and selection according to values of cosmological constants that make for stability and, to be known, by life. However, the metaphysics goes far beyond this in its demonstration of a Universe without Limit: every physical picture is repeated without limit and this remains still a fragment of structure against a transient / void background. Physical science suggests, at least to many physicists, that we are an accident in an alien ‘universe’ (the cosmos) (if we were accidental and alien it would be remarkable that the accident would be the only source of significance to and in the Universe). Some physicists however find that added assumptions, e.g. life will continue forever (which is not inconsistent with physics) lead to more sanguine outcomes (e.g. omega point theory where perhaps by computer emulation we, finite machines that we are pictured to be in those scenarios, will live eternally as part of an infinite state computer AKA the Universe and, to some, AKA God)

Is Universal Metaphysics inconsistent with science, e.g. with physics; with the alien universe picture; with the sanguine picture? It goes beyond physics (immensely), it contradicts the alien picture, and it far outstrips the omega picture. I find the omega picture interesting at least as science fiction and one of its values is that it tends to discredit the alien picture. In any case, the alien picture is not a necessary consequence of modern physics and cosmology but merely some combination of assumption regarding the essence of matter (to be material is to be not experiential) and projection of an emotion (often, I think, the result of rejection of a religion that gave false hope, especially when taken literally). Therefore, I shall discuss only the question of consistency with formal science itself and not with various projections and special assumptions

We often think that science, especially physical and life science, has revealed essentially all of the world for we seem to have reached the close to limits of the universe (the cosmos) and close to the limits of the very small. However, the theories of science are not necessary; they are projective; and no matter how successful so far the possibility remains that there are ‘universes’ beyond the limits we appear to have reached (the very large and the very small). Does science (or common experience) say that such universes exist. No, but it does not disallow them. What is the variety, size, and duration of these universes—collectively and individually? Science does not say; it allows that the variety etc. may be anywhere between small and without limit. Why then do so many scientists, philosophers, and others think that science has reached close to the edge? It is because the domain of current theories of science and what we have seen so far are roughly coextensive and we therefore tend to think that we have seen almost everything (at least in principle). To put it in other words science is both spectacles (worldview or metaphysic) with which we see and the spectacle that we see (world). I may add that not too long before the revolutions of the twentieth century (associated with Einstein, Heisenberg, Schrödinger, and others), many scientists thought (and some wrote) that but for a few loose ends physics was complete (some of those loose ends—apparently minor to some but disturbing to others—were occasions for relativity and quantum mechanics). In summary, science itself and its method leaves open the question of what lies beyond its current borders

Therefore the metaphysics is not at all in contradiction with science. In fact the metaphysics requires all facts. A brief formulation of the metaphysics is that whatever is possible is actual. This suggests that the world could be other than it is and this in turn suggests that the metaphysics and the fact of the world are in violation. However, for the facts to not be the facts is not possible. The facts must be the facts and therefore, even though this is trivial, the metaphysics requires the world to be as it is

The common view of (physical) science is that we have at any time a conceptual and predictive theory (or theories) of the Universe that agrees with all the physical data and that when contradictory data is sufficient, the theory is then invalidated. In the process of data accumulation the empirical boundaries are pushed outward; therefore new theories must be more inclusive: they must explain new data, agree with old theories and data where they are valid, and to win acceptance they must predict and agree with the results further new experiments (if the theories are explanatory and predictive of new phenomena, they will suggest new experiments). The picture, then is often taken to be, that of science pushing the boundaries of the known universe out (or in if at the micro level). Some thinkers think that physics (its theories) asymptotically approach final knowledge of their domains. This however is not known to be true and the reasons for this as well as for the appearance of being asymptotic have been given above. It is not known from science whether there is any approach to finality, asymptotic or other

The Universal Metaphysics shows that for a detailed empirical science there cannot be any such approach. For a non detailed or abstracted science there can of course be some attainment of finality for the Universal Metaphysics is—may be regarded as—just such an abstracted science and it is empirical as well for experience is already built in to the basic concepts of Being, Universe and so on and as we have seen the metaphysics is predictive and so has at least some degree of testability (falsifiability) for a final physical theory, though currently rather remote, is not out of the question (on the merits of physics itself)

In view of the metaphysics, then, what is to be our view of science? Instead of the ‘hypothetico-deductive’ approach (invalidating data, new theory, new predicted data, moving out the boundaries, still new data of which some may be re-invalidating) which leads to the picture of science pushing out the boundaries to the edge of the Universe the metaphysics suggests the following alternative picture. Within its domain of validity each theory is not ‘just a theory’ i.e. not only projective (which it may be as it pushes out) but is a simple fact (made up of simpler facts). Every new structure is larger, incorporates the old and some of the new but is also a fact

And what of scientific method? Since, according to the metaphysics, we never reach the edge of the Universe with science and since we do realize that edge but only as endless process (while our form remains finite) scientific method will expand to incorporate immersion and participation of our being in the process of the Universe. This is already done in anthropology and if we look at the real interaction among science, government, and people this is in some measure how science is done in general at least in its absorption into the institution of society

19 On conceptual Realism. The final doubt about PB concerned such issues as Conceptual (including conceptual) consistency. Since empirical consistency is about consistency between percepts (Concepts) and concepts (also Concepts), we could perhaps view the empirical as a form of Conceptual Realism

However, right here our concern is that of relations among concepts. PB asserts that any (referential) concept has reference. But what of a concept that is a compound of two concepts? And what if those concepts stand in contradiction. We are tempted to suggest that for conceptual Realism the principles of logic must be satisfied

Consider the statements ‘the apple is green’ and ‘the apple is not green’. That the two statements cannot be simultaneously true follows from a logical principle called the principle of non-contradiction (the truth of the principle seems to have an obvious character). Consider the statement ‘either the apple is green or it is not green’. This is an example of the principle of the excluded middle: statements are either true or false (the possible truth values are ‘true’ and ‘false’ but no other). There are systems in which the principle of the excluded middle is not true: some statements could have another truth value such as ‘unknown’ or ‘fuzzy’ or ‘in between’ or etc; or some statements might have no truth value whatsoever. Some statements seemingly have no truth value at all. Bertrand Russell did an interesting analysis of the latter case and found some paradigm statements that seem to have no truth value but for which there is a deeper representation of the statement where truth values are immanent. However, I believe that he did not prove that all statements can be reduced to such deeper levels. For example when we make an assertion X, it is implicit that it can be written as “X has a truth value and that value is ‘true.’” This form leads to an interesting resolution of the famous liar paradox in the form ‘this statement is false’ (it is true if and only if it is false) for we can see that while ‘this statement is true’ is not similarly paradoxical (it is true if and only if it is true), it follows from the deeper form that (in that form) it is false for it has no truth value. The point is that a relatively deep logical principle has been questioned and this questioning, even though there are answers, raises the question of the certainty of logic. Now, the principle of non-contradiction is near sacred (if a contradiction is allowed there is an explosion of truth and all assertions are true) but even this has been questioned in alethic logics that allow non-contradiction but quarantine explosion

Therefore logic (the logics) are suspect as a measure of Realism

Discussion continues in the note on Logic

20 On Logic. We therefore define Logic as the requirement on our concepts for Realism (reference)

This might seem to make Logic empty. However it is not conceptually empty from PB. And it is not operationally empty from the classical and deviant logics: they are approximations to Logic

How does logic as deduction follow from Logic? As considerations on two or more related concepts

Clearly this notion of Logic includes trivially all the cosmological examples already given (as well as most of those to be given—it includes all but the inclusion is not trivial in all cases)

However, the unlimited nature of the Universe implies that Logic harbors complexities and depths unfathomed by limited Being. Here lies an ocean of imagination and discovery (and criticism)

From previous considerations, Logic may be extended to include factual Realism and science. The ocean expands to include ground

What of existential Realism? It is a stretch to include this in Logic. At minimum however we can adjoin it to the Logic so far and rename the join Logic. It is more than a join for the existential faces the fact of no absolute certainty (versus whether this is a fact or an artifact of our limits). Ocean and ground now include heavens and sky

Logic, which we may also know as Realism, is metaphysics. It is the realm of the Limitless

21 The Logos is defined as the object of Realism (Logic). The Logos is the Universe in all its detail

22 Metaphysics is knowledge of Being as Being and so the metaphysics of any Domain, if there is a metaphysics of that Domain, must be unique. The metaphysical system demonstrated above is a metaphysics of the Universe and I have therefore called it the Universal Metaphysics; since it is unique I also refer to it as the metaphysics. Though unique, a metaphysics may be developed in different degrees of detail; these are not examples of non-uniqueness. A metaphysics may have different ways of expression; and these are not cases of non-uniqueness. Thus the following statements of the Universal Metaphysics are equivalent: (a) There are no Limits on the Universe (it could not be greater) (b) The Universe is the object of Logic. Another equivalent statement is (c) The Universe is Absolutely Indeterministic. The meaning of absolute indeterminism: is that for any part of the Universe, given a state, its state at another time may be any state. Absolute Indeterminism and Limitlessness imply one another and thus the form (c). This may seem puzzling if we associate indeterminism with chaos, randomness, or absence of any stable structure. However, even if an initial state is structureless, the state at any other time will be any state, e.g. structureless or one of structure: structure will not always arise but it will and must arise (earlier reflections on possibility indicate that there is no Universal distinction between ‘will’ and ‘must’; these distinctions arise as a result of our embedding in the Normal, e.g. this Earth, where they have local validity). No mechanism is necessary even though it seems likely that the Normal route to structure will have a mechanism (e.g. variation and selection of some form). Thus, e.g., the formation of an unlimited array of cosmoses against a transient / void background is inevitable. Further the Universe will—must—have manifest as well as unmanifest phases. This is not (in the least) inconsistent with, i.e. it is allowed (though not required) by modern physical cosmology. PB in any of its forms resolves the puzzle that has been labeled (by Heidegger) the fundamental problem of metaphysics, i.e. Why there should be anything at all: the resolution is that there must be times of manifest as well as ‘times’ of no manifest Being (in the main narrative it is seen that the question ‘What has Being?’ deserves the title of fundamental problem of metaphysics). It is clear from the foregoing that the Universe neither has nor needs substance; thus the metaphysics is a non-relative metaphysics without substance (this is a resolution of the question of foundations in a way that goes against modern thought: either foundations are relative, e.g. to a deeper level and this entails infinite regress, or they are non-relative but based in substance, whether ‘stuff’ or axiom etc.). The foundation / substance may be thought to be the Void but, first, the Void is not a substance in the usual sense (unchanging undifferentiated / fixed) and, second, from indeterminism any state / Domain is equivalent to the Void

23 That the metaphysics is foundation without substance shows its ultimate but finite depth; the metaphysics is simultaneously shallow (and trivial) and deep

24 Whatever obtains is at least implicit in the metaphysics; there is as seen much that is explicit but this explicitness is finite in some way and therefore a speck in relation to the variety / extent / duration of the Universe which must therefore be ever in a state of realization / knowing for a finite or otherwise limited form

25 General Cosmology is the study of the variety, extension, and duration of Being (it includes, therefore the question of whether spatial and temporal extension, i.e. simple extension and duration, are the only kinds of general extension). Its methods include use of the development and results of the metaphysics. It will refer to science and experience for inspiration but except where these can be shown to be necessary it will not depend on them for proof. Examples are given in an earlier note. In the main narrative a systematic treatment will be given to extension and process and their nature and necessity; to Being, space, and time; to mind and matter; and to other topics

The values to this cosmology include its intersection with and illumination of the sciences such as physical cosmology (e.g. extension and duration—space and time—are shown to be relative but may in limited domains be as if absolute) and its inspiration and, together with traditional knowledge, illumination of ways to realization (universal)

26 The concept of Identity is developed in the main narrative. In that development the concept of ‘Object’ is developed as preliminary; the concept of Identity is an aspect of objecthood

27 There are significant implications at the intersection of just about every human endeavor, e.g. destiny and hope, the nature of human being, science and religion and every major academic / intellectual / cultural discipline

28 One further implication concerns the concept of the Object. The concept is problematic on account of instrumental error / distortion and, especially, projective contribution to form. However, we have seen that there are objects that are perfect via abstraction, e.g. Being, Universe, Domain, Void, and Logos. The perfect case is developed in some detail in the chapters Being and Metaphysics. The chapter Applied Metaphysics develops the interaction between our limited but important knowledge of states of affairs within this cosmos and the metaphysics. Two kinds of practical measure of object are developed: the practical or ‘good enough’ and the Valuational. It is suggested that every context has a limit of knowability which may be approached. The approach form value shows that when the ‘applied’ cannot achieve epistemic perfection, there other modes of perfection such as the Valuational itself, the good enough, and the existential. These considerations concern what is called the concrete or particular object but may extended to ‘abstract objects’. In the chapter on objects we find from the metaphysics that (in contrast to current views) the distinction between concrete and abstract is one of knowing, perceptual-empirical for the concrete versus conceptual-symbolic for the abstract, that metaphysically (ontologically) there is no distinction and that practically the distinction not watertight and, further, go through phases in which they are considered concrete, then abstract, then perhaps concrete again and so on… and phases in which they are treated as mixed

29 Another implication concerns Power. Power is (defined as) degree of Limitlessness. The Universe itself is ultimate in power in that it has no Limit and that it is as great as or greater than any other (i.e. any one of its Domains, e.g. cosmological systems and individuals). Since the Universe is All Being it has and can have no creator; and it needs no creator. PB implies that there are concentrations of creation that we may call gods or God but these do not create the Universe. The Universe needs no creator (the idea of creator to explain the Universe and its wonder is paradoxical since the Universe is All Being and inefficient for it is no explanation since it now pushes explanation one step back: who created the creator)

Subject to these considerations there are gods / God / Gods and other lesser powers. Perhaps organic (in the sense of arising intrinsically and by reasonable mechanisms) forces are more efficient but still the random and the God case obtain. Further, if ‘God’ is a concept then it / he / she cannot be limited to the limited imagination of human beings of the past. Unless we have imagined every reasonable and potent possibility / necessity, we cannot be atheists; we cannot even be agnostics for we do not know what it is that we have no knowledge; we can perhaps be ‘second order agnostics’, i.e. we can claim ignorance of the concept of God rather than its possible range of objects. Two factors of distinction are significant: God as immanent versus remote; and God having acute versus diffuse to infinitesimal Identity / personhood (and the entire range may / does obtain). Anthropomorphism is not ruled and therefore obtains if insignificantly and infrequently; it is also significant that it is anthropomorphic to think that our forms of ‘I’ and ‘you’ are the only forms; we can appreciate a range of ‘i’ and ‘u’. In the end, the question of God reduces, in some ways, to a preference of naming and not of Being and one consideration is the desirable (for some) versus undesirable (for others) attributes of the immensely Limited traditional conceptions of ‘God’

Limited forms have access to Power; however, access may be difficult. The treatment of Power therefore identifies mediate forms, this world, this cosmos, their forces, culture, tradition, ideas and symbols (including art, literature, religion), other persons, intelligence, experience, experiment (…) that are initial means of access

30 The term ‘Journey’ is appropriate since the process resembles a journey: there is no final destination, destinations are not known even though we have a sense of destiny (or not), there are multiple ways, some are abandoned, some abandoned ways are picked up again, the process is important as means and enjoyment, it begins where we are (in the life of the spirit we are always at the beginning). Incidentally I am not inclined to ‘spirituality’ in many of its extant forms. I do not think of this world as material and another world as spiritual; there is one world; I do not think of spirituality as something done at special times and places; rather the idea concerns how we live every moment—with a sense of presence to the immediate and the ultimate and perhaps with care for all; it is not goodness per se, that flows from what we become; and, of course, there may be occasions of practice and places that inspire us to presence…

The word Being is as we have seen fundamental to the development of the metaphysics. It is fundamental in relation to the journey for the additional reason that it frames the process in a way that ‘matter’ and ‘mind’ do not (at least in their usual connotations)

31 These are Ideas (The Metaphysics, Tradition) , Practices (Experiential, Reflective, Traditional: e.g., yoga, meditation, psychoanalysis…), and Implementation (in life, action), Catalysts (Traditional, Experiential, Experiment), Imagination, Reflection (criticism), Experiment… Details are in the main narrative in Chapter Journey, the sections Framework, Dynamics of Being, and Ways

The essence of the process, I think, is that we are all on our own, individually and collectively. The issue with expertise is that it leads us to believe that there is some perfect expertise, some perfect teacher who will show us the way. There are better and worse; if there were real perfection it would be so immanent as to proclaim its own virtue as apparent. Teachers are useful; but no one is nothing. Use teachers, methods, ideas but in the end you (we) reflexively on your own and in company of others all for whom: In the Life of the Spirit We are Always at the Beginning

My experiments, progress, and future thinking is described in Chapter Journey in the section Future and Past

32 Two sources of knowledge of freedom are as follows. First, PB requires it. Second, analysis of psyche shows it as follows. We have new concepts. They are not new to the Universe but they are undoubtedly new to us for five billion years ago there were no concepts on Earth. A deterministic system contains nothing new. We can conceive and labor (intelligently or not) toward ends that (a) we may have conceived but seemed practically impossible, e.g. just out of range (b) that we did not even conceive earlier. The process is not easy; it may be difficult; and it may be infrequent. However once begun we may build upon it and even cultivate the process itself. It requires an indeterministic element in psyche that is the spark for new ideas that are selected upon by reason and experiment. The difficultly and infrequency is one reason for beliefs in determinism. Reaction to constraint, which is normally real, and to determinist belief, and to the view of the Universe as alien and to life as an accident, are among the sources of the idea of freedom as natural and easy that has been cultured by some analytic and some existential philosophers. We can now see that what is accidental from one perspective is necessary from another, especially the Universal, perspective. The actual case lies in between the two extremes but is displaced because here I do not see human being as static; we are defined by our form as well as by human potential and Universal necessity

I hold that freedom follows from careful self examination but, since others may not find this to be the case and or may otherwise not agree or disagree, do not here pursue self examination as a source of knowledge of human freedom

Modes of Psyche

The Concept and concepts. Referential Concepts

Objects. Existence

On Logic and Reference

Signs and Icons

Meaning

Analysis of Meaning

Analysis of the Conceptual-Linguistic Meaning of Being and of Linguistic Meaning

Doubt as Dual of Certainty

Doubt in Clarification of Meaning

…and Therefore in Understanding the World

Doubt as a Source of Method and its Coeval Character and Emergence With Content

…the Example of the analysis of Experience

Summary of Method So Far

This Method So Far is an Abstract of All Method

Introduction to The Way

Primary Phase. Being

Ideas

Transformation of Being (Action)

Special Phase. Technology and Artifact

Organic-Mechanical

Social

Tools and Ways

Issues

System of Experiments

Principles

Phase of Being

Self, Culture and Society

Psyche, Spirit, Body / Being

Nature and Catalytic Practice

Special Phase

Organic-Mechanical Being

Social

The Essential Ideas1, Concepts2 and their Meaning3

Central Statements—A Short Version

2—Meta and Para material

4—Introduction

5—Ideas

2—[Being, Metaphysics, Method] [Universe]

1—[Void, Principle of Being—PB] PB—The Universe has no limits

1A—Fundamental objections to PB

1A—Meaning and Significance of PB

8—[PB—Cosmological Form] [Matter, Mind, and Identity]

2—Individual identity is equivalent to Universal Identity

2A—Meaning and Significance of the Identity. Journey

6—The World and the Universe are—ultimately—the same (new)

9—Realism (i.e., conceptual realism) is the condition for the system of concepts to have reference

10—[Logic—necessary and sufficient, physics, theory of objects—implicit in UJ, and cosmology]

11—[Power, science, God, lesser powers, access to Power via mediate power]

3—Journey

12—There is a way

13—Self identity is ever coming into Being. In the life of the spirit we are always at the beginning. There is no final nirvana, overcoming, samsara, Samadhi, death, or pain)

14—[Moment and Universe… through Religion]

2'—Transformation and Guide

2'—The way of the Journey

Universal Journey: Origin and Nature

The Work

Motive

Reading the Text

Experience

Meaning

Doubt

Fact of Experience

Fact of Real World

Existence

What is metaphysics?

Is metaphysics possible?

A variety of consequences of the Principle of Being

Doubt

Logic

Substance

Science

Fantasy. Religious and mythical cosmologies

The Universal Metaphysics

Applied Metaphysics

Attitude. Faith

Method

Religion

The Essential Ideas 1, Concepts 2 and their Meaning 3