Being is a function of Time

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prothero
 
Reply Thu 13 May, 2010 11:48 pm
@Deckard,
Deckard;164113 wrote:
I just became aware of "process philosophy" and I don't really have a grip on its main premises yet. "Possibilities" seems to be central to process philosophy and you mentioned that word several times in your response. Can possibility be a variable? No, not really. However, keeping with my original idea of f(t)= x = Being, I think the possibilities would be the field over which this function operates; you can picture that as the Cartesian grid, space, multi-dimensional space which contains all possibilities. By this, the possibilities do indeed precede both temporality and being. Would that work for process philosophy?
well equations may do for approximating the physical properties of objects but I think words do better for the realm of human experience. A realm of possiblities is I think essential for a systematic philosophy based on process. Materialism of course is not really a systematic philosophy for it does not address the realm of human experience, values or aesthetics. Unless you accept the world as purely accidental and purposeless, there must be some basis for order and value and the beauty of life (a realm of possibility). There may be some, but I do not know of any comprehensive systematic philosophy which lacks a notion of transcendent value or possiblities.
 
north
 
Reply Thu 13 May, 2010 11:50 pm
@jack phil,
Being is never a function of time

because time is a function of measurement

and the measurement is based on the movement or behavior of objects based on their chemistry and interactions between themselves
 
Reconstructo
 
Reply Thu 13 May, 2010 11:54 pm
@Deckard,
Deckard;164135 wrote:
There is a difference between beings and capital B Being.

Absolutely. But what is it, this difference? Is Being just an abstraction of/from all that beings have in common, which is nothing but the unity that makes them individual (quantized/framed) beings? Of course, being is also existence, but what isn't that we can speak of?

---------- Post added 05-14-2010 at 12:58 AM ----------

Deckard;164135 wrote:

Thinking again about my understanding of prothero's comments I see that actual Being and possible Being are related to each other as is a line (or curvy line) to a plane.


Or one could also argue that possible being is actual "non"-being, also known as concept or time (or man qua man). The now, or present being, in this perspective, is spatial, and only spatial. The past and future are "here" (an abstraction, a strange word...), but not spatially. (Thus "nonbeing") It seems that discussions like these, as one example of the language is man is time theory, transcend the glyphs they are spatially "carried" by.

---------- Post added 05-14-2010 at 01:00 AM ----------

prothero;164136 wrote:
well equations may do for approximating the physical properties of objects but I think words do better for the realm of human experience.


Generally I think you're right, but it has been a nice little excursion thus far. Metaphors are oily, and offer the rainbow of qualia. I think of number as words that have been bleach. Still, the terseness of mathematics has certain advantages.
 
north
 
Reply Sun 16 May, 2010 08:07 pm
@Reconstructo,
Being has nothing to do with time , at all , ever
 
prothero
 
Reply Sun 16 May, 2010 08:25 pm
@north,
north;165106 wrote:
Being has nothing to do with time , at all , ever
Well maybe not in Plotinus the ONE, or Plato's realm of the forms or the eternal realm of God but down here in the world of "material objects" and physical laws, nothing "exists" is "real" or is "actual"which is not temporal and changing. So the realm of possiblities may be eternal, changeless and outside time, but the realm of the "actual" is temporal.
 
Reconstructo
 
Reply Sun 16 May, 2010 10:44 pm
@Deckard,
"Being has nothing to do with time..."

I strongly disagree. The concept of "Being" developed historically. Abstractions like "time" or "being" don't seem to be something children are born with. And what are beings? How can essences be established with experience and memory?

Question: do concepts exist spatially? How is it that we see reality as something divided up into named parts? Why do we see the table as separate from the floor? How did we learn to slice up the visual field into objects with names experience automatically as if integrated within a causal and temporal network?

It seems obvious to me that concept has something to do with this. I think we have concept to thank for the perception of beings as independent beings in the first place. And if these concepts aren't spatial, where are they? Time can only be perceived by creatures with a memory, in my opinion, and memory is conceptual --in that even our memories are described in terms of objects/beings --a conceptual organization of experience.
To sum up, I suggest that time and beings as intelligible serperate unities are both made of the same thing, a nonspatial sort of being known as "concept."
 
 

 
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