Being and becoming

[jeremiah175]

To "be" is to exist, to have "being".

Where there is "being", there may be said to "be" a "some-thing" that "is" rather than a "no-thing" that "is not".

All things in the world "are", that is, they exist.

An existent thing affects, is affected, or both.

Is "becoming" preceded by being? Must a thing first "be", first exist, before it can undergo a "becoming", or does its "becoming" precede its "being"?

"Being" seems to denote specific states, many (if not all) of which are temporary, as nothing which "is" seems to exist in a purely static state.

Strictly speaking, there has never been "nothing", no absolute vacuum or void. All things have "become" or taken their "being" from a preceding and seemingly unbounded energy or "ground of being".

It seems then that generally speaking (e.g. the world as a unified whole), "being" precedes "becoming", but specifically or particularly (e.g. the earth, stars, humans), "becoming" precedes being.


What are your thoughts?

JVS

[Xunzian]

[Mastriani]

Oh quit it Xunzian, you don't believe that, at all.

[Xunzian]

Well, there is a difference between symbols and reality.

I think that the symbol of the taijitu is very powerful, and the idea behind it is useful in terms of self-cultivation.

Do I think that it works as a metaphysical explanation for why everything exists? Certainly not. But the idea of being and becoming which is fundamental to it is an important one to understand.

[Mastriani]

I would agree with you, accept for one glaring oversight, which I know factually, you are already aware of from previous discourses.

Being and becoming in the Western sense, naturally predicates all existence or event of existence, between the eyes of men.

The Eastern concept is that the process of becoming transitions into being, only to recede and eventually return.

The taijitu is the greatest expression of wu li as concerns the Universal becoming of the procession. It won't be understood, at all.

[Xunzian]

Well, I do think that there is a seperation between 'understanding' in a reductionist sense whereby I 'understand' what is before me because I understand each of the parts that create the whole vs. 'understanding' on a symbolic, holistic level.

For example, I could ramble on and on about how the archetypes that are present in the human psyche came to be and what manifestations of our past they represent . . . or I could write a play/book/movie that makes use of archetypes.

The taijitu is a symbol whereby we can practice the latter of those two options. While understanding the different parts of it (such as where li and qi figure into it) have great implications as to how it all plays out, ultimately the power of the symbol is neither increased nor diminished by these ramblings.

As a symbol there is relatively little to understand. It is a representation, not an actuality.

[Mastriani]

As a symbol there is relatively little to understand. It is a representation, not an actuality.

Uh, no. For a few, there is relatively little to understand, and anything of the mind is representation and not actuality. That's a given.

[Xunzian]

Well, I was assuming that the 'person' I was using in that discussion would have the background necessary to make sense of the symbol.

Even the simplest of symbols is totally meaningless without the background.

[Mastriani]

Well, I was assuming that the 'person' I was using in that discussion would have the background necessary to make sense of the symbol.

No offense Xunzian, but considering the context of the current medium, that strikes definitively of error. That assumption can't simply be taken for granted.

Even the simplest of symbols is totally meaningless without the background.

Exactly correct, we agree. So how does one explain taijitu to someone such as jeremiah, who was honest in saying he sees no means for becoming prior to being, where as the understanding of the symbology in question is predicated upon a perspective of all as becoming, and being as simply a microcosmic perspective?

[tentative]

One needs to make the transition from being, to being as, to becoming. It's a tough sell to the Western cosmological understandings. Would it help to mention that what is apparent sensically is a becoming as a persistent particularness existing for a period of time? This allows an understanding of duality without denying a processual universe.

Of course, I've just made as much sense as you guys have....

[Doug.E.Barr]

One needs to make the transition from being, to being as, to becoming. It's a tough sell to the Western cosmological understandings. Would it help to mention that what is apparent sensically is a becoming as a persistent particularness existing for a period of time? This allows an understanding of duality without denying a processual universe.

Of course, I've just made as much sense as you guys have....

Because becoming what we are capable of being is central to my view of life, I was going leave the comfort of my thread long enough to make a comment. Maybe later. I have to stop laughing first. Then I have to have a nap so I don't fall asleep while playing scrabble with my 91 year old mother. I must maintain my priorities. She is convinced she would win more often if I could keep track of the score. She is probably right.

[Xunzian]

Mas,
Granted. But if I had a nickel for everytime I had to Google, then go to the library (gasp! with real books!) for everytime someone on ILP recommended a book to me, a philosopher to me, or just said something I just didn't understand, I'd be, well, certainly not rich but next month's rent would be a good sight cheaper.

[Mastriani]

Mas,
Granted. But if I had a nickel for everytime I had to Google, then go to the library (gasp! with real books!) for everytime someone on ILP recommended a book to me, a philosopher to me, or just said something I just didn't understand, I'd be, well, certainly not rich but next month's rent would be a good sight cheaper.

Xunzian,

If I had a nickel for everytime I had to Google, then go to the library, (Yea, real paper books with references!), for every time Xunzian on ILP recommended a book to me, a scientific theory to me, and just said all manner of things that I just didn't understand, I'd be, well, close to the wealthiest man on the face of planet Earth.

This is twice today we have agreed ... the planets are out of alignment, certain doom is upon us.

[Xunzian]

Naahhhh,


We usually agree on pretty much everything. Until we either get to the very basic foundational stuff, where we totally and completely disagree or the esoteric random stuff, were (again) we totally and completely disagree.

If we were living in Ming China, we'd be dressed the same in court except for our belts. Oh, and the books we had back in our rooms.

[Mastriani]

One needs to make the transition from being, to being as, to becoming. It's a tough sell to the Western cosmological understandings. Would it help to mention that what is apparent sensically is a becoming as a persistent particularness existing for a period of time? This allows an understanding of duality without denying a processual universe.

Of course, I've just made as much sense as you guys have....

Inherent problem with divergent idealogies, cattle herder can't understand the sheep herder, and vice versa.

Human communication is SO effective, isn't it. I'll just be over here becoming self so.

[Xunzian]

*shrugs*


We've got a pretty good grasp on where we disagree, don't we? I'd say our communication is working quite well.


You're just wrong. And the sooner you start burning insense to your parents the better!

[Mastriani]

*shrugs*


We've got a pretty good grasp on where we disagree, don't we? I'd say our communication is working quite well.


You're just wrong. And the sooner you start burning insense to your parents the better!

LOL, ouch.

Again, I think I'll just sit over here with my dunce cap on and await becoming.

P.S. I've been all out of real Sandalwood for about a month and a half, no time for trips to Chicago for refreshing the supply. I'm a becoming a bad child being.

[Doug.E.Barr]

It has been an afternoon of tears. First tentative evoked a tear of laughter. Then I shed a tear of joy as Mastriani and Xunzian disolved into a puddle of goodwill. I can't take much more ILP today.

Anyway jeremiah175 here is my comment. My parents were (be)coming and as a consequence I came into being. Coincidentally, I started becoming what I am genetically capable of being within the severe restrictions placed on me by our collective "reactions to the void". That's it. Further discussion is equivalent to interpreting the latest arrangement of Nietzche's bones scattered on the philosophical desert sand.

[Ierrellus]

Being is becoming. Becoming is being. No matter how you splice and dice them; they remain inseparable. Reductionism renders neither as the source of the other.

[jeremiah175]

Being is becoming. Becoming is being. No matter how you splice and dice them; they remain inseparable. Reductionism renders neither as the source of the other.

I don't know that such is the case. Whereas Being is a state, Becoming is a process. States of being seem to antedate becoming by virtue of the fact that becoming is a process of moving through states of being. Before one can move through one state of being to another there must first exist an antecedent state of being, no matter how primal.

[Ierrellus]

jeremiah175,
You are still trying to bifurcate a process mentally. There are no physical clues as to what you are saying. Read Heraclitus.

[jeremiah175]

jeremiah175,
You are still trying to bifurcate a process mentally. There are no physical clues as to what you are saying. Read Heraclitus.

Are you referring to Heraclitus stance that all this constant flux? This I understand and agree with (as it relates to the apparent world), however, the idea of flux itself necessitates a kind of existent substance (being). Without being there is no flux as there is no-thing which exists which may be in flux.

[Ierrellus]

jeremiah175,
Flux alters all definitions of being. If you want being to be some constant in equations of existence, you will have to alter its meaning beyond its reality. If I'm mistaken, set me straight. It appears to me that you want a static definition to apply to a dynamic process.

[jeremiah175]

Flux alters all definitions of being.

Ours may simply be a problem of semantics. My position is that being is differentiated from becoming in that being is the antecedent to it. Being is essential to becoming, as without being there is nothing that may become, hence my statment that being is a state and becoming is a process. To say there is being is to say that there is existence. There can be no becoming without being, no becoming ex nihilo.

[Ierrellus]

jeremiah175,
If you mean, "I am; therefore, I think." I'll buy that.