a philosophy book i'm planning on writing

hi all

if you’ve read my theories you’ll know i need help with detailed aspects of life and the universe. I’m trying to explain the whole universe and absolutely anything that will ever exist, as a chain of events.

The major problem is that few ‘intelligent’ people are willing to accept their inability to control the universe, with the result that i face severe obstruction from the academic world. I need some academics and non-academics who understand my theories to help explain it to the logical masses out there in the world.

if you have read my essay on conclusive determinism (at essays and theses) and understand it 99-100% get in touch hopefully here or you can e-mail me at matmilne@hotmail.com and we’ll make a start on firstly getting a paper into the philosophy section of this forum, then into philosophy magazines and books.

let me know if you think you can help
matt

Your ambitions are large, and you will need to do a lot of work to better establish your ideas before you can find people to spread them for you. So far you have only produced an outline of your ideas. If you want to change the world, you gotta do the work. If you have already won critical acclaim as a music composer you might want to focus your energy there and only dabble in philosophy as a hobby.

Actually, i’m going to try both, obviously music would be the earning force.
What the theory involves is pretty much everything. so to write a convincing paper i’m going to need dna experts, evolution experts, astronomers, astrophysicists, mathematicians…
that’s what the pitch is for.
The subject is so vast i.e. it involves the whole universe it would take several lifetimes to even make a start. What i’m hoping is that a few mad and brilliant people, with as much imagination and subsequent ambition as i have, will contribute a chapter to the book. Obviously a book that proves the meaning of life as the meaning of life and everything would be a bestseller for at least a decade. Think of the billions of dollars it would make.
Every contributor would get a cut of the profit.
All we have to do is prove that life is a chain of events and then find a way of making a convincing argument, then publish it and hey presto! the world will change, probably overnight.

Look it’s daunting, i’ll admit but it’s not difficult nor is it a lot of work.

think about making a bowl of cornflakes, doing a sum, reading a book, driving a car, thinking, writing a book, playing a musical instrument, running a race, drawing a picture, buying milk, etc
all of these things need the universe to be a chain of events otherwise they just wouldn’t happen. Your own brain even works on the principal of input-process-output, that is a chain of events too!

Come on people, it’s not difficult, just a little daunting.
All you have to do to convince yourself is conduct an experiment.
Think in my terms for one day, and analyse the events you participated in.
It should occur to you that at each second, minute and hour something was changing to allow the next event to occur, be it getting in your car to drive to work, to do work then come home again, or cooking or reading a book.

Reading a book, how is that a chain of events i hear you asking?

when you see the first word your brain has to recognise and record it, then the eyes have to move to the next word, which has to be recognised and recorded then pasted to the previous word, then the next word and so on. When you get to the end, run the events backwards and if the process was a chain of events you should arrive back at the beginning of the book, and should be able to continue beyond that, and with enough knowledge all the way back to the beginning of the universe.

Please, in the name of a philosophically simpler future, please try to understand or at least try the experiment. I know it’s hard to give up your beliefs in order to see things differently. I should know i was the son of a minister of the church, brought up strictly with the bible and believed in it as a child, but even i managed to look at things from a completely different angle and come up with this.

Look i don’t want a simple existance, i want the truth and the only way to get it is to look at everything and break it down to one element. that element is the reason why everything is in the universe. It shouldn’t be hard to find as it exists in everything!

That’s why i arrived at the conclusion i arrived at.

The only thing everything had in common was that they changed position in the universe every second, i.e. a series of events were occuring every second causing an expanding/unfolding universe which could be traced back to its origin, i.e. it was a chain of events in time causing the movement into the future, therefore the universe was an unfolding chain of events. life was part of this chain and so life itself was a chain of events. So the meaning of life, since the meaning of events is to cause the future to become the present, is to carry out the chain of events so that your future state would become your present state.
In other words the meaning of life was to carry out a chain of events.
These events would depend on where, when and why the life was created but would ultimately cause the future to become the present.

I wish you could all see this, and i have no idea, when history is staring you in the face and screaming ‘i am a chain of events’, why most people insist the universe is random.

hey everyone, since it is unlikely i can set up a thread for the development of this book, i’ve set up a yahoo group instead.
All conclusive determinists welcome.
groups.yahoo.com/group/conclusive_determinism/

matmilne’s new quotes
when asked why i was trying to prove and publish my theory i replied
“I think it’s about time those free willers paid for the last 6000 years of human suffering and religious dictatorship”

“christian aid isn’t a charity, it’s an advertising agency”

Well, you’re right about that. You know what? The analysis of the subject has been going on for a couple of centuries and it will probably go on for a couple more. Billions of people already were involved, and they don’t need you to lead them.

Actually it has been proven that people who want to lead people to solve the “biggest issue of all” are the least able to actually do this kinda work. So well I hope you are a decent musician so you can make a living and maybe one day really contribute to the solution…

You are trying to propose causal determinism as your “meaning of life” causal determinism has been around since Democritus around 2500 years ago.

Way to be 2500 years late on a theory.

The answer is still out on determinism, a lot of people believe in it, a lot of people are waiting for quantum physicists to give us the answer…

honestly… have you read any philosophy at all?

here’s the answer

life is a chain of events: fact
meaning of life is to carry out those events:fact

bada bing bada boom.
The universe would be completely unpredictable if that wasn’t the case.

Seriously, try to see in the dark.

how do dreams fit in your theory of chained events?

Dreams again equate to a series of electrical impulses and chemical releases in a particular pattern, started by the chain of events thatt result in you becoming asleep.
The REM pattern is a good indication that a chain of events is occuring when you dream. (the pattern changes during sleep and wake periods indicating processes in your mind)

Anything in the mind is a series of chemicals and electrical impulses released by cells in a continuous sequence.

Say this book that you’re gona throw out… is it gona cost?

matmilne,

By your definition “meaning” is what happens, or what is going to happen—simply because you define it as such. I agree with your deterministic stance, and your arguments conserning this are themselves sound. However, not everyone would agree with your definition of “meaning”. For instance, my meaning in life is the attainment of pleasure/happiness and the avoidance of pain/unhappiness. I choose this definition, because I look at “meaning” as something I define myself. Other people require meaning to be externaly defined by a “higher beeing”, in which case meaning may be to obey the will of said entity.

Is meaning:

  1. What happens (what we do)/what will happen (what we will do)?
  2. What we should do, and by whos decision?
  3. Whatever we define it to be?

Personally I think we should choose the most useful definition, the one that lead to the most desired result. At a personal level I observe that I desire pleasure, and so I define my meaning as attainment of that pleasure. A society may, for instance, define meaning as the general happiness of the population. These are all abstractions, but much more useful than saying that meaning is “whatever happens”. If I defined that as the meaning of my life, I could just as well lay down and die.

yes and in order to obtain pleasure you have to do what?
that’s right carry out a chain of events.
If the meaning of your life is to have pleasure then the meaning of your life is to carry out a chain of events.
magical aint it.

uni
it’ll only cost if there are a few people helping who demand movey.
Personally i am interested in publishing the truth, if its going to spread over the globe within a year or two, it needs to be sitting in piles at street corners for people to pick up and read, so no hopefully it won’t cost a penny. But then again how will i find a publisher or cover the cost.
enter film music.

The only real cost is paper and ink.
If i can earn enough money to publish adverts to a free access internet site then yea it’ll be free.

do read the revised version of conclusive determinism. I removed the determinism part, it was causing controversy.

Any of you have any bits to contribute to the book please submit them to me via e-mail or here.

Matt I tried to tell you on the other post. I seriously do respect your ambition, but this particular project is not going to fly.

I think that you think you’ve found an original theory, and it makes sense in your mind I’m sure… but it’s not original, in any way really, and this book is just not going to happen. I’m telling you this now because I don’t want you to waste your time.

Take a couple days and read up on some determinists, and try to take a step back and look at what you’re saying (I know that sounds hard but smoke some pot or something). A couple axioms is not enough to do what you need to do. Believe me, if you had found what you think you’d found… everyone on here would be like ‘whoaa!!’ instead of saying the stuff that we are.

But I know you’re smart, keep thinking.

gobbo, i’ll say it again

in no determinism theory, have i read, “life is a chain of events, the meaning of life is to carry out those events”
That exact quote IS original.
Show me where it’s written or slink away.
Come on gobbo, since you’re so determined to stop me you must have some evidence to back up your claim.

Have you read the revised theory, cheeky monkey?
No?
Unless you can come up with a previous theory where said phrase is quoted, this book’ll go ahead.
whether you like it, or not, Naysayer, i know your type, and as i have been advised many times by people who left uni to start their own companies, i will ignore you.
How dare you try to stop me wasting my time.
that’s what they said about music and that aint been the outcome so far so thanks for your useless advice, i’ll ignore you, naysayer.

gobby, i suggest you read some of the more complex discussions i have partaken in.

He’s got you there, Gobbo! :>

Congrats. Though, from that angle, the book is destined to be very short. Maybe you should consider writing fortune cookies instead?

I know my life is a chain of events. But what is the purpose of calling it the meaning of my life? What do we, as humans, gain by saying: “The meaning of my life is to do what I do”, which is essentially what you are saying…

Perhaps you should define “meaning” for us, and why it is the best/correct definition.

yes that’s very true uccis. I probably should.
Oh by the by, the revised theory has changed the original to explain random phenomea as well, so thankyou ucc. Skepticism is called for.
this book will be more of a panflet
Speaking of free will, i’d appreciate any thoughts on free will and chained events. eg you wake up, you decide to have breakfast, you decide to shower etc.

This theory does allow random or free events as well as determined ones.
We even cover skepticism in that life really doesn’t have any special meaning. This theory states that the universe is what it is.

According to baggini that is a new take on this philosophical question.

The reason, gobbo, why this theory hasn’t had the woaaa!! efeect is the same reason why a new religion doesn’t result in a global conversion. even if the religion is proved to be correct, some people will still choose something else.

You assume that if i was right everyone would see it. Wrong. Your theory would make enstein a very smart person. He wasn’t. Totally stupid. He thought something still could be moving, daft person. If he was that stupid, how then could he come up with relativity, gobbo?
why aren’t there any geniuses like him any more gobbo?

celox you make a valid point.
it will take a bit of thought before i reply.

i guess i chose that definition for meaning because it best fit the model of our universe.

in our universe both animate and inanimate objects are created form other objects, interact with other objects in our universe, break up or join up to become another object or become parts of other objects.

That pretty much explains everything form subatomic particles to birds in the sky.

These processes then become parts of other larger processes.

take a cell for example.
Made up from complex processes (chain of events) part of a much larger set of processes (eg internal organ) itself part of a larger chain (eg person) part of a larger chain (eg a day on earth) part of a larger chain (eg a day in the universe) part of a larger chain…

To me the ultimate reason for anything, even something like one hydrogen atom, is to be part of the larger chain.

all the other theories only part explain the universe and life’s place in it.

I chose the meaning of life for this because not only does it describe life, the events carried out in life. It describes how life fits into the universe. It describes life’s place in the grand scheme of things.

I guess this whole theory started with the idea that the answer to the question “what is the meaning of life” should explain how you were created, everything that you do in life, and what will happen after you die.
It should explain life, its place in the universe, and the universes plase in whatever grander scheme of things there are.
It is a rather arbitrary, personal belief, that i wish i could explain further. If you give me more time i’m sure i can clarify more.

what you ask is a deep question, effectively what is the meaning of meaning, the only answer i can give at the moment is to do what it does.
that explaining what it is here for, that effectively being the meaning of it.

like i said deep question that will require more than my mind to solve.