Epistemology Archive Dump #2

Monday 27Jul92 From [Dat Sneaky Ol'] Jeff

Nah, it isn't working ... we don't know each other well enough and the methodologies are too different. These things happen sometimes - we'll find a better topic, I'm sure, someplace else, or maybe when we get more familiar with each other. Real philosophy is very heady, and along with art, this is one of the very few things that matter deeply to me. Our conversation is misfiring enough that I would rather back off and get to know you better. It's a tribute to you, actually, to get me into this serious a vein - serious enough to want to avoid misunderstanding and the errors introduced by the self-consciousness of being in a semi-public forum.

Unlike those who tend to deny their intuition and the evidence of their senses, I have a great deal of respect for my mind and what it can do and the accuracy of its ability to know what is real (my speech for the day) :-)

Monday 27Jul92 From [Mysterious] Big D [After ya]

"real"?

Tuesday 28Jul92 From louise

This is simpler in math: "Real" is any number that is negative or positive in value. If you use the structures and definitions of math they provide excellent analogies for the "levels" of perception. That is something I will now contemplate. I still haven't found a good use for emotional numbers.

Tuesday 28Jul92 From [Mysterious] Big D [After ya]

I was refering more to Jeff's last sentence, "real"?

Wednesday 29Jul92 From [Dat Sneaky Ol'] Jeff

Louise, don't be silly. You use "emotional numbers" all the time in the
recreational practice of numerology.



Friday 31Jul92 From [C'est] Shay [...La Belle Dame Sans Merci]

I think I'll just ponder on my own favorite philosophical "problems":
1) Does art imitate life, or life imitate art?
2) Does the end justify the means?
These are the two that I argue most fiercely with myself. Good to think
about when you can't sleep at night.

Friday 31Jul92 From louise

Mayno, Mr. Jeffer, I am not a numerologist. I am only an apprentice
kabalist. Please issue a public apology.

Friday 31Jul92 From [Dat Sneaky Ol'] Jeff

I am deeply sorry that Louise is an apprentice kabalist. How was that? And
don't apprentice kabalists ALSO dabble in emotional numbers?

Saturday 01Aug92 From louise

The emotional number I have is:
you ready?

42. OK. NOW figure it out. Did you do the horoscope on that Taurus I
told you about?
if you don't recall the figures are 5/13/90, 12:01 a.m., Tucson Arizona.
32 degrees north, 118 degrees west.

Saturday 01Aug92 From louise

I was told that the Lord of Epidemiology - sorry - Axiology and Epistemos -
will be descending into the earth sphere shortly.
And then he will speak to us. I speak of course, of our New Descended
Wastrel: Chief of Clan and Sept: Helix of Quark. Surveyor of Fine
Allegories, Purveyor of Fine Kilt.s
guilts?

Sunday 02Aug92 From [Dat Sneaky Ol'] Jeff

"42" ... yes, that's the age of the only soap opera actress who still gives
me hot pants; or, at my age, warm pants. I have reviewed with interest the
astrological data you have given me, and loosely concluded that this person

a) was born in the same space-time continuum as Kaiser-Frazer automobiles
b) will have trouble in some area of their life, but will also have some
good days
c) probably shouldn't buy a home near the Love Canal or the Hanford nuclear
dump site
d) may have a spiritual crisis in their early twenties involving the fact
that these priests and scientists can't really prove anything and that
adults sometimes lie
e) will have more than one relationship with the opposite sex, but upon
reflection in their later life, will find that one actually stood out
more than the others

The mighty Omarr the Jeff awaits your next query ...

Sunday 02Aug92 From Helix Quark

(appropriate thunder for realized prophetic arrival)

Well, after a lengthy silence, heilx returns from a gruelling foray in
the desert of mindless jobs:
for whomever is still in this room, and also for whomever is still
interested in the discussion of epistemology:
indeed, I agree with jeff, we can argue conclusions until we are blue
in the face, but if we refuse to examine the proofs then we will still be
playing rebuttal games until the end of time and have gotten no further
than a Python-esque 'yes it tis, no it tisn't.'
As a preliminary lumination:
The proof as I see it for the realist model is as follows:
I perceive
and I know
therefore I know I perceive
coll. I perceive I know

The proof as I see it for the 'absurdist' model is as follows:
I perceive
and I am uncertain
therefore I am uncertain I perceive
coll. I perceive I am uncertain

it is in the reconcilliation between 'I know' and 'I am uncertain' that
we have so far failed and this is the failure of our epistemology.

Now there is a third model that has been suggested here.
The proof as I see it for the process model is as follows:
I perceive
and I am still in the process
therefore I am still in the process I perceive
coll. I perceive I am still in the process

All three of these make an interesting trio. Here you must forgive my
scholarship, since I thought of this part while in the shower.
'nothing is. nothing becomes. nothing is not.'

'nothing is' - ( ... I know. )
'nothing becomes' - ( ... I am still in the process )
'nothing is not' - ( ... I am uncertain )

(BTW- I am out of the shower now)

Realist- Nothing is- this model I suggest is the Aristotlean true-false
view that 'A=A' or that 'perception equals reality'
Processist- Nothing becomes- this model I suggest is the evolutionary
view that 'A approaches A' or that 'perception approaches reality in direct
proportion to the change in energy by time'
Absurdist- Nothing is not- this model I suggest is the quantum
true-false-maybe view that 'A is not A' or 'A maybe A' that 'perception
equals perception and perception maybe sombunall (some but not all) of
reality'

The problem as I see it is that the given individuality of perception
leads to 'perception prime equals reality prime' but 'reality prime does
not equal perception N not prime'
if Rp =/ Pn (that is to say that if the territory is not the map) but P
= R then these statements contradict,
UNLESS, Pn = Rn but Pn < Rp (that is to say that perception equals the
map but less than the territory) then this implies the existence of Rp (the
territory)
but if the map does not equal the territory and the only territory to
experience is the map then at the MOST Pn equals sombunall Rp there is an
unexperienced totality in Rp that can never be perceived, that is to say
that there is something beyond what can be perceived.


'it used to be thought that physics describes the univers. now we know
that physics only describes what we can say about the universe.' --Neils
Bohr

I do not deny that perception equals something, but what I think that
perception is is perception. I do not think that my perception of something
IMPLIES that others will perceive this something as well. The preponderance
of the evidence does indeed show that it is most likely my perception is in
accord with OTHER perception, but this is a bartering of the same coin. I
understand that there is the possibility of dissonance. I understand the
possiblity that my perception was attenuated toward the general and that
further perception will show more detail if given energy. I certainly do
not think that my perception equals yours or that of someone walking on the
other side of 5th avenue.
the question of knowledge remains. reality is some invisible statue to
which we must papier-mache our perceptions upon in order to see?


Sunday 02Aug92 From Helix Quark

btw- I stole 'sombunall from R.A. Wilson.
I would suggest that 'Quantum Psychology' by Wilson speaks to much
of what I fear I have been inadequate in presenting regarding the position
of the 'absurdist' view which, by the way, takes in to consideration the
current scientific view of what we can and cannot say about reality.

I think in essence I am agreeing with N. Bohr 'that science cannot
find "one deep reality" underlying all relative instrumental realities ...'
(Wilson) when I argue that perception does not imply SUBSTANTIVE reality.

I am particularily interested in sharing with you part of what
Wilson writes in chapter twelve,
"The DNA and the sensory/neural apparatus produced by the DNA
creates what ethologists call the umwelt (world-field) perceived by an
animal.
Dogs and cats see and sense a different umwelt or reality-tunnel
than primates...
The belief that the human umwelt reveals "reality" or "deep reality"
seems, in this perspective, as naive as the notion that a yardstick shows
more "reality" than a voltmeter, or that "my religion 'is' better than your
religion." Neurogenetic chauvinism has no more scientific justification than
national or sexual chauvinisms."
(emphasis in original) ppg 91-92 'Quantum Psychology' by R.A. Wilson
Falcon Press Phoenix 1990

I think that the realist model speaks well of perception AT THE
LEVEL OF PERCEPTION, but I do not think that it can be logically held that
that model works beyond that level. The 'physical' rules implied by my
concept of 'chair' are implicit in my perception of a chair, but this does
not imply that all that I perveive as a chair IS a chair. On the level of
perception, if I perceive a chair then a chair it is by definition, but is
it really a chair? I perceive it as one ... this is a chair vs. 'this' is a
chair.

Monday 03Aug92 From louise

Well,
I thot that science had already identified the one underlying deep
instrumental reality, or at least, the force which animates it, because
science demonstrates the use of that force on a constant basis. Energy.
E=MC squared. Energy equals mass times the speed of light? isn't it?
squared? The postulate behind the General Theory of Relativity?
Light is a component of that energy, part of its equation. Mass is part
of the equation. Mass, and light. Is this so difficult? "Mass"
analogically speaking, could be called "the body", or the perceptions of its
body. The "constant" in this plane, at least, is the speed of light, which
in this physics is 186,000 miles per second. The speed of light could be
thought of as the perceptions of the mind, or of the spirit. They are part
of the energy equation in this realm, in this physics. Not in every
physics, just the ones that work in our local solar system and provable on
this planet. We haven't proven it elsewhere, we just know the math works
here.
It's been a long time since I took Experimental Physics. In Experimental
Physics there is a portion on astronomy: under the heading "Calculating
Apparent Motion and Actual Motion", there is the observation of the body and
of the instruments of the body - the telescope and its lenses - and then
there is the logarithm by which one calculates "actual motion" by
subtracting the motion of the Earth with regard to the body whose movement
is being plotted along the plane of the ecliptic. There is heliocentric
astronomy, (sun centered), geocentric astronomy, now known as "astrology",
and cosmic astronomy. The mathematics of each depends upon locus of
observation and the equation or "filter." These can all be used as
analogies for "being", "ways of knowing." Geocentric astronomy is readily
"provable", by any kid looking out of a telescope. Heliocentric astronomy
must be addressed through the filter of languages, the language of physics
which brings the apparent motion of the stars and planetary bodies into line
with the view "from the sun." Are we M in the equation, or C?

Monday 03Aug92 From Helix Quark

I think that if you pick up an itroductory text to the theories of quantum
reality or the holographic paradigm you will find that the theory of
realativity doesn't demonstrate the 'deep reality' refuted by the copenhagen
interpretation. If anything the theory of relativity shows that 'reality' is
relative to the observer re: time and the passage of it. The thoery of
relativity does nothing really to show a consistant and definite reality.


Monday 03Aug92 From Helix Quark


" Human language has its source in phenomenal experience; hence, it is
limited in its application to states of being that are beyond that
experience; logic is grounded in the mind as it related to the phenomenal
order; hence, it is unable to affirm, without at the same time denying, what
extends beyond that order. 'All determination is negation'; to apply a
predicate to something is to impose a limitation upon it; for, logically,
something is being exluded from the subject. The Real is without internal
difference and, in essence, is unrelated to the content of any other form of
experience. The Real is thus unthinkable: thought can be brought to it only
through negations of what is thinkable. "
- pg 11 'Advaita Vedanta' Eliot Deutsch University of Hawaii 1969 OP

Louise, I think that when you mentioned that when you speak within
the semantics of different viewpoints that the logic holds for each that
this came to mind:
The realist model holds on the level of perception in the illusion
of maya. It 'barters the same coin' and is complete on that level.
The absurdist model speaks of the inability for that which is based
on the phenomenal level to speak of that which is beyond.
When the wordless semantics of the Numen 'speak' of that which is
beyond words this too is of a different level.

We are talking about the attenuation of the Kabalistic Tree of Life
from Ain Soph Aur down the lightening path to Malkuth and below.