Truth

@Owen phil,

Yeah, I agree that that's a fair use of the word. But what is being devoid of other properties?

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;113124 wrote:

Yeah, I agree that that's a fair use of the word. But what is being devoid of other properties?

Not having properties? Nothing is devoid of properties. I thought I made that clear. You don't think that because Only if X exists does X have properties, that something can be devoid of properties, do you? That would be contradictory. If for something to exist, it has to have properties, then how could something be devoid of properties? Nothing is devoid of properties. Bewitchment of language.

@Owen phil,

I see that view. And it's always been part of my total view about "being." At the same time, being ties in with consciousness. What is consciousness? Is it equivalent to being?

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;113109 wrote:

But as the term "exist" is actually used, having properties is both a sufficient and necessary condition of existing. So, X is hard does imply that X exists. Nothing can have a property unless it exists.

Isn't sufficient reason the term Schopenhaur uses???

Being as a sort of different meaning from existing... Existence as a whole is an infinte which we presume the same on the far side, much as we see God as we prefer God...Being is more verifiable... But not all we conceive of has more than a moral being...Some notions, truth, for example has only a meaning, and not a being...Find any number of specific examples of truth and you have not discovered much at all of truth, which as a moral concept exists only in our lives, and our need for life....Life is impossible to prove and it is our one undeniable truth...

@Fido,

Fido;113129 wrote:

Isn't sufficient reason the term Schopenhaur uses???

S. talks about, the principle of sufficient reason. The principle that for anything to exist (or not to exist) there must be a reason for it.

In logic, P is a sufficient condition for Q = If P then, Q. And Q is a necessary condition for P = If not Q, then not P.

So, for example. Decapitation is a sufficient condition of death, but no a necessary condition of death. And the presence of oxygen is a necessary condition of combustion, but not a sufficient condition of combustion.

@Owen phil,

Has anyone been struck by existence itself as strange? Not what is but that anything is? (I suppose that this is an "existential" question....)

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;113132 wrote:

Has anyone been struck by existence itself as strange? Not what is but that anything is? (I suppose that this is an "existential" question....)

I guess so. I suppose that is why Leibniz asked, "why is there something, rather than nothing?"

---------- Post added 12-20-2009 at 11:02 PM ----------

Reconstructo;113128 wrote:

I see that view. And it's always been part of my total view about "being." At the same time, being ties in with consciousness. What is consciousness? Is it equivalent to being?

I would have to know what Being was, first. Or, rather what sense it makes to ask about "Being" as if it were ordinarily used as a noun, when it is not.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;113134 wrote:

I would have to know what Being was, first. Or, rather what sense it makes to ask about "Being" as if it were ordinarily used as a noun, when it is not.

I agree, it's a strange word. Hegel thought that indeterminate being was nothingness, or rather the concept of nothingness. Is this the presence (concept) of an absence (referent)?

Is the transcendental ego such a nothingness? Are being and consciousness part of the same riddle/bewitchment of language?

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;113136 wrote:

I agree, it's a strange word. Hegel thought that indeterminate being was nothingness, or rather the concept of nothingness. Is this the presence (concept) of an absence (referent)?

Is the transcendental ego such a nothingness? Are being and consciousness part of the same riddle/bewitchment of language?

Alexius Meinong makes the most sense of the notion of Being that I know of.

Alexius Meinong - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

@Owen phil,

Wittgenstein:
5.631 There is no such thing as the subject that thinks or entertains
ideas. If I wrote a book called The World as l found it, I should have
to include a report on my body, and should have to say which parts were
subordinate to my will, and which were not, etc., this being a method of
isolating the subject, or rather of showing that in an important sense
there is no subject; for it alone could not be mentioned in that book.--

5.632 The subject does not belong to the world: rather, it is a limit of
the world.

5.633 Where in the world is a metaphysical subject to be found? You will
say that this is exactly like the case of the eye and the visual field.
But really you do not see the eye. And nothing in the visual field
allows you to infer that it is seen by an eye.

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;113142 wrote:

Wittgenstein:
5.631 There is no such thing as the subject that thinks or entertains
ideas. If I wrote a book called The World as l found it, I should have
to include a report on my body, and should have to say which parts were
subordinate to my will, and which were not, etc., this being a method of
isolating the subject, or rather of showing that in an important sense
there is no subject; for it alone could not be mentioned in that book.--

5.632 The subject does not belong to the world: rather, it is a limit of
the world.

5.633 Where in the world is a metaphysical subject to be found? You will
say that this is exactly like the case of the eye and the visual field.
But really you do not see the eye. And nothing in the visual field
allows you to infer that it is seen by an eye.

And the point of quoting these passages from the Tractatus is?

@Owen phil,

I feel that his subject ties in with the problem of being and consciousness.

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;113145 wrote:

I feel that his subject ties in with the problem of being and consciousness.

Any particular reason? And, anyway, why the quote? If you think that, then why don't you expatiate on what Wittgenstein writes?

@Owen phil,

Well, I felt it would be more polite to see what interest there was in the subject. It's not debate I'm after. Or not so much anymore. I found that quote to be want of the more exciting bits of the Tractatus. I'm interested to see what excites people, more than in debate. Folks are who they are. I want revelation more than conflict. What does so-and-so enjoy? That sort of thing. Enthusiasm.

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;113114 wrote:

I agree. Existence is like a predicate behind all other predicates. "Being discloses beings." But that's only if we don't make it clear in context that "exist" is applied in the objective sense. In the objective sense, the issue of Being (Heidegger's sort, capitalized) can be ignored. And I think we usually know from the context what is expected.

Existence is indeed a predicate but, it is not a primary predicate.
Rather, it is the logical sum of primary predicates.

Fa -> a exists.
Ga -> a exists.
(Fa v Ga) -> a exists.
EF(Fa) -> a exists.
etc.

Nothing exists, is contradictory.

(It is not the case that something exists) <-> (nothing exists).

But, something exists, is a logical axiom of first order predicate logic.

Ex(x=x) is tautologous, Ey(x=y) is tautologous, because Ax(x=x) is an axiom of FOPL=.

What exists? Quine's answer is "everything", ie. Ax(E!x) <-> AyEx(x=y).

Existence applies to empirical things (physical objects) and it applies to abstract things (mental objects).

The moon circles the earth -> The moon exists.
(1 is odd) -> (1 exists).
etc.

@Owen phil,

I appreciate the trouble you went to. I'm not sure that formal logic can fully address what I'm after, though. I'm interested in the concept as experienced. What do you make of the concept "nothingness"? I'm curious.

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;113186 wrote:

I appreciate the trouble you went to. I'm not sure that formal logic can fully address what I'm after, though. I'm interested in the concept as experienced. What do you make of the concept "nothingness"? I'm curious.

"nothingness" is nothing at all.

There is no thing that nothing is. ~Ex(x=(nothing))

(nothing)=(nothing), is contradictory.

"nothing" is not a value of any variable.

What do you make of the concept "nothingness"? I'm curious.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;113134 wrote:

I guess so. I suppose that is why Leibniz asked, "why is there something, rather than nothing?"

---------- Post added 12-20-2009 at 11:02 PM ----------

I would have to know what Being was, first. Or, rather what sense it makes to ask about "Being" as if it were ordinarily used as a noun, when it is not.

There is plenty of nothing to go around...Perhaps the reason the eastern religions have not examined creation is that it is a mental cul de sak...Or perhaps, a roach hotel for philosophers; They check in, but they never check out...

---------- Post added 12-21-2009 at 06:50 AM ----------

Owen;113193 wrote:

"nothingness" is nothing at all.

There is no thing that nothing is. ~Ex(x=(nothing))

(nothing)=(nothing), is contradictory.

"nothing" is not a value of any variable.

What do you make of the concept "nothingness"? I'm curious.

Nothing is not a concept, but an infinite...As a word, it asserts what it denies...

@Fido,

Fido;113197 wrote:

.As a word, it asserts what it denies...

That's more like it. It's the presence of an absence....

@Reconstructo,

Reconstructo;113155 wrote:

Well, I felt it would be more polite to see what interest there was in the subject. It's not debate I'm after. Or not so much anymore. I found that quote to be want of the more exciting bits of the Tractatus. I'm interested to see what excites people, more than in debate. Folks are who they are. I want revelation more than conflict. What does so-and-so enjoy? That sort of thing. Enthusiasm.

If I want excitement, I'll go see a Clint Eastwood movie, or the new Avatar, which, I read, is very exciting. And, as for, enthusiasm, John Locke had interesting things to say about it in his Essay. But, in his days, "enthusiasm" meant something like, "fanaticism". "The effulgence of an overheated brain" he called it.

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