On Reality

Day 48

Are we able to figure out anything more about reality now than we did before? I'm not so sure that we can. We still know that the world exists, as well as everything in it, and that there are possible things out in reality beyond the circles of the world. I call them possible things, but really we don't know what they are – a thing is a gem, which is a part of the world, so that a thing which is not part of the world is not a gem – but all we know is what is in the world, which is a bunch of gems. Gems are certainly complex, being made up of shards, connecting to each other, and appearing to have various forms either in the world where everything is connected to everything else, or else in points of view, where they appear to involve and invoke certain connections and forces which are part and parcel of a logical field, one of many possible logical fields within the logical field of the world, which allows for multi-sided objects – gems.

So we have an understanding of the world, and all that is, but this does not mean that we have an understanding of reality. We know that the world can exist as it does, and but that doesn't tell us what the world actually is. We can view ourselves in the world as a foreign object while still remaining ourselves in the world(being self-reflective), the world in us(being self-analyzing), the world in the world(investigation), form picture and ideas of how things connect(theorizing), exist(change or do), and hide away(intentional ignoramus), among other activities. We can, as the world, appreciate the world – yet this only tells us about the world, not about what lies beyond the limits of the world.

The world occasionally expands, changing shape and form in reality, either by the world's recognized and known activity or by some unknown force from outside. These expansions are the addition or removal of limits on the world, and the transformation of x>p's and x>a's back and forth from each other. Sometimes spaces of possibility are let in, and sometimes they are let out of, the world, but if we recognize that is is, then no world we have knowingly encountered has been a closed world. All our worlds are open worlds, at least so far. A closed world is a place where no surprises happen, and an open world is a place where we do not know for sure what might or might not happen, and do not know how to answer some questions. Closed worlds are filled with gems which have no unknown cores, us among them. That is to say, that just as no world is known to be closed, so also is no gem closed in such a world. We do not know for sure that a gem is complete, or that there is not another way to view, understand, or define anything whatsoever in the world in such a way that it cannot be viewed, understood, or defined as itself, and yet also something different from itself. However, we can understand that all gems are potentially consistent with each other in reality.

All gems are things in the world, and thus things which exist. So, being something which is, it is. Reality for sure contains that thing, that gem, because it is here now. However, this doesn't actually help us all that much. Gems, things and ideas, appear to be inconsistent with each other to us most often because different points of view conflict with each other in the world. As we view a thing with more than one eye, understand that things have more than one side to them, and move into conflict along two possibility-lines following multiple logical fields with our large minds, the world as we conceive and act in and of it starts to have holes and stresses throughout, which undermine stability. Eventually we either relive the stresses of logical fields, close the inner limits of possibility area holes, or shatter and reform all or part of the world into a more stable pattern. This expansion of the world does, we hope, mean that as our world grows stronger without denying the existence of anything, that our world slowly becomes more contiguous with reality. However, because reality contains the word, and since the world is open, more than the world, we have no way I see of, from within and of the world, being sure that reality is as we say it is. Even if the world is closed and complete with no unknowns, then unless we also understand the world in a 4-d shape, something might come from reality to the world, happening in a future which is not what we thought it would be. As long as we are ignorant of the future, there might be the possibility of something impossible happening, which we cannot discount because until it exists in the world, no matter if our logical field says it is a possibility or not, we don't know that x>a, to resolve the question of x>p or x>~p. Even if we do understand the world in a 4-d sense, it seems that we would also need to understand that the world was also not 5-d shaped, or that there was some way the world could not move, because it was not possible to do so in reality. Thus, to be sure that the world matches reality, we would already need to know what reality was, for reality to be inside the world. In such a theoretical place, the world would be more than reality, and thus what is not in reality would be in the world, but if what is not is, then it is, so it exists in reality. The impossible becomes real, showing the world to be unstable, and so showing that the limits of the world are not the limits of reality. So, I know of no way to be sure that the world is all that might be, coul dbe, was, or will be, the case.

In a more mundane sense, one of the things which we suspect to be true is that we are all human, and thus that we all have a humanistic point of view. Your opinion on what counts as a humanistic point of view changes with your understanding of what it is to be human, but can in its most general sense be said to be all the points of view which we have ever encountered here on this planet among beings which we can communicate with on an intellectual level. I find this to be the theory behind any universalizing moral or intellectual argument – that one assumes that the logical field, possibility space, and area fo reality which is the world, that is accessible and viewable from the human point of view, is some fundamental truth without which the world will be forever unstable, or is something in the world that matches up perfectly with something in reality. Because the world is open, we do not know this for certain. Any such belief is forever an assumption which could be shown to be false by a person who honestly held a point of view which is incompatible with that view, or who has an experience or lie which that view says is not possible. A universalizing moral or intellectual theorist can deal with this event in the same ways we deal with any world instability. You can expand the world, reinterpret the gem, ignore the fact, or deny the validity of the statement. This does not mean that there is not some truthful, valuable, and real universalizing moral or intellectual argument or fact, but that I don't see how the single human facet we have of access to the gem of that, in the limited world which lies in reality, is going to grant any surety about that. Indeed, I doubt that we should have even a faint hope of being sure of any universalizing moral or intellectual argument or fact until we know that we are alone in the universe(which we won't know while the outside force or reality can keep the world open), we understand what the limits of being a human actually are(which we won't know until the inside force of free will can't, not won't but can't, keep the world open), or we meet some alien non-human being who can give us access to another facet, offering substantive evidence that our idea of that fact or argument is actually right(which we won't know until we communicate with them). These of course are not surefire methods of obtaining proofs, and the sunrise might not happen tomorrow – but hopefully they can stand you in good stead, next time somebody says that they are absolutely right. They might well be, but they can't prove it in the world. Can't force rules; only advice.

It often seems hopeless to learn something certain; that a certain knowledge of reality is forever beyond our grasp, and that we are stuck here in the world of dreams and illusions, of angst and worry, or of play and work, but not yet creation. This does not mean that we do not create, or that we are not real – it only means that we do not know so, and that we have not found the answers to the deep questions of life, the universe, and everything, within the bounds of the world. We also do not know that the answers do, or do not, exist – such remains to be seen. As long as we exist, while we are being and doing, as long as we live in hope, as long as we are brave, and as long as we try, the world, slowly but surely, changes form, so that we continue to adventure in and explore reality. Perhaps one day, if we keep on walking and dancing, thinking and singing, we will figure it out. I don't offer promises or proofs, definitive arguments that this is the one and only way to figure it all out, but only my personal ideas after thinking about a blade of grass - Only advice. Advice which I find has helped me, advice about reality and the world, advice which I suspect is partly right and partly wrong, being one aspect of the world from my point of view. It may or may not be good and useful advice for you or me. It may or may not stay in the same shape, as I and the world slowly continue.

The expansion of the world proceeds in three major ways: the investigation of the forces which we attribute to reality which is science; the fact of existence and act of doing and choosing which we attribute to our free will, that is living; the investigation of gems in the world which are the parts of the world, and that we can call philosophizing. I am not a scientist in my daily life, and though I feel competent to understand what scientists have to say and write about, I do not typically engage in scientific work where I seek to understand the universe a little better one experiment at a time. I am of course living, or trying to live, but while the expansion of the world proceeds apace in this way, successful communication of that to others is notoriously unreliable - proceeding mostly by example and action - which I hope to say something about directly by doing things like writing, or indirectly by showing some of my thoughts, feelings, and history. By trying to keep my words silent, and speaking in other ways. What I am left to try writing about, is philosophy.