On the Possible Natures of Existence

Philosophy Forums Philosophy
1

We could perhaps all agree upon the fact that the question “What is the nature of existence?” cam not be answered with certainty. If we can agree upon that, then we could perhaps also agree that the possible answers to that question fall into one of several categories:

  1. The physical universe was created by a physical process (i.e… big bang) which occurred at random - and our human existence emerged as a random coincidence.

  2. All possible universes were/are juxtaposed in a primordial chaos which collectively contains an infinite number of universes. OR existence is stuck in an endless cycle of a new universe being created from the destruction of a previous universe - and since this cycle would happen endlessly, then eventually all possible universes would manifest due to the nature of infinity. Our life as a human being then, would have been existentially necessitated - since all possible universes exist (or have already existed, or will exist in the future), then the universe containing our human existence would have had a 100% probability of occurring, and we had a 100% chance of existing.

  3. Our universe was designed/created by another being - perhaps our universe was created by God or gods; perhaps our universe is a type of complex computer simulation created by humans or other intelligent beings; or perhaps both of those two possibilities are the same thing.

  4. All existence is inside of our own mind, and each individual subconsciously projects an existence around themselves as they go along, being unaware of the fact that the physical world they live in (and the events which take place in it) are being created by their own mind.

Now, it seems that all the possibilities we can come up with would be similar enough to one of the four above that we could simply categorize them together into one of those 4 categories:
- Cosmic Coincidence
- Cosmic Necessity
- Intelligent Design
or
- Solipsism

Now, I propose an answer to the question “Which one of the four possibilities is the true nature of our existence?”
The answer is that all four possibilities (and in turn all the possible variations of each of the four possibilities) exist together in synchronicity. Each possibility is true, but any implications from one possibility can not negate the existence of one of the other possibilities - hence, they are all synchronized.
This means that we could, in a sense, exploit the implications of one possibility - so long as it does not violate the synchronicity between other possibilities. For example, we could exploit the implications of solipsism by tapping into our subconscious to make predictions or even alter the outcomes of future events, and perhaps even manipulate existence itself - but since we would also have to satisfy the presence of the other 3 possibilities, the predictions/alterations we made could only occur in reality insomuch that they could equally be dismissed as coincidental. Perhaps for this same reason, “acts of God” appear just as equally as coincidences.

The explanation for this synchronicity:
If we could somehow take an objective macroscopic view of all existence, I believe that we would see chaos in its essence; all values would be fluctuating and indeterminable.
Only the presence of chaos can account for the physical creation of the universe. Without the element of chaos, we come across many problems in giving any sort of a physical explanation for our universe’s origins.
Chaos was the primordial essence, and it is exactly for this reason that all metaphysical possibilities which preceded our physical universe were never determined by being refined out of the chaos, and as such they remain indeterminable. Because of the nature of chaos, an indeterminable value will contain all variations as being a possible reality, and the primordial chaos will create (or have contained within it) a separate universe for each possible variation - but because the 4 possibilities regarding the nature of existence are metaphysical, they were never determined (because their being determined was never necessary for the continuity of the physical universe).

2

I tend to lean toward logical necessity, though, I cocieve of it somewhat differently than you. Rather than an infinite number of universes, ours just being one of them, I believe ours is the only universe that could be. The reason being, there’s an an equal chance of there being presence/positivity/yang and there being absence/negativity/yin. Therefore, everything probably would be/is a mix of these two forces. Also, it would be impossible to cocieve of one force without the other. Where there’s life there’s death, where there’s pleasure there’s pain, hardsoft, lightdark, bigsmall, goodevil, attractionrpulsion, subjectobject. Nothing really changes, change is illusory. So you see, there can’t be multiple universes and even if there were, they’d all be the same as this one anyway, at least in essence. One force seems to prevail over the, but only for a while, because of the laws of chance, the limits of conception, and the interdependent nature of being, being cannot be without an other to play with. The

3

dialectical universe, our universe, is the only possible universe.

4

Perhaps the title of this threa should have been The nature and origin of the universe, since more than anything, the origin seems to be what you’re asking for,and that is what I gave you. Randomness, logical necessity and God, are the fundamental possibilities that come to mind, and just how you concieve of God or logical necessity, will affect your coception of the nature of the universe. For the philosopher, I suppose those 3 possibilities would be the most relevant, for the religious man, God, for the shallow man without conviction, randomness, and for the philosopher, logical necessity, but perhaps the poet would sooner believed the world was spawned from some feeling, orlonging of some kind.

5

As for the possible natures of the universe, many possibilities spring to mind. Materialism, idealism, monism, dualism, pluralism, pantheism, infinite, finite, temoral, eternal, beautiful, hideous, holism,reductionism…

6

Perhaps the nature of existence is precisely that which cannot be reduced to or encompassed underneath any possible predicative conceptualization? Wouldn’t this be the most sufficient definition of a “possible nature of existence”, given that we are dealing with what is most universal and thus what is least particular, least able to be particularized?