There are absolutely no absolutes...

Philosophy Forums Religion and Spirituality
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Recently I wrote in response to tentatve’s question as to where the “Case against theism” had moved that:
“It is over in the Rant House. I guess the message being that the reasoned case had become nothing but a unreasonable rant.”
Satyr has taken this in the wrong way. I could have PM Satyr but I wish to give the case a chance. Why? Because contrary to what Satyr understood, I thought that Satyr’s arguments well well-reasoned, blind to the consequences of it’s own premises, but well reasoned nonetheless and yet, and I think unjustly, it was moved into the rant house as if that is all it was. Let me start this post by responding to Satyr.

— Once more any attack on estalbished mythology is considered hateful and ranting.
O- Not by me. I believe that any belief has to be, not once, but constantly attacked.

— No answers were given, besides evasive redirections and childish wishes.
O- On Thursday, May 8th I gave you an answer, in a line of answers, which you have yet to respond to. No answers were given? Read it again then:
[b]Hello Satyr:

— The “dilema” is resolved by analyzing the very nature of consciousness and language.
O- It does not matter how you analyse or explain what you consider to absolutely be “consciousness” or “language”, the “dilema” remains of absolutely stating the non-existence of absolutes.
You should consider learning the forum mechanics before posting.
— I just explained what the ‘dilema’ is. If you did not understand it, that’s unfortunate.
O- I just explained the irrelevance of the explanation you think you’ve provided with the issue at hand. Don’t get me wrong, I agree about the issue of projection, but the dilema is still there in what is stated regardless of what reality is besides that I think it is.

— Here is one more try.
The very nature of human cosnciousnes is what creates the absolute.
O- I agree.

— There is no evidence of any absolute
O- …except this one absolute that there are no absolutes.

— unless you project it as the underlying ‘thing-in-itself’ or God or nothingness/somethingness.
O- I don’t even need to do that, nor do you. It is enough to report outside of your sphere of experience and state what IS rather than what it seems, appears, to you. You try to objectify your subjective experience then you are making the relative (your experience applies only to you) into an absolute (claiming that your personal experience is applicable to all). All this is, as we agreed, created by the very nature of human consciousness (and even this is but another construct), and I add, the faculty of reasoning. Absolutes need not be real in fact, but we cannot reason, we cannot avoid our nature totally, without some absolute. We need absolutes even in order to recognize absolutes. This does not mean that the world is not in change or that the world is left unchanged. We are finite beings that report as IS what should be reported as IT SEEMS TO ME. Reality, the world, in it’s totality, escapes us. We merely arrest a fraction of it…we make up the part that escapes us by our reason, our constructs, our projections, our recognition, warranted or not, of patterns.

— In order to make sense of reality the mind freezes it, like taking a snapshot. This enables the mnid to store it, study it, know it and share it, via language.
The snapshot is incomplete and a simplification.
O- The mind is not so much a fridge-- it’s bussiness is not freezing-- as much as a prophet. The prophet does with God what the mind does with Nature: Seek patterns that gives us a measure of control. Knowledge, language are about control. What we know is likely to be incomplete. What we say may be real only in our ideas, but, in either case the issue of control is solved. I talked earlier about the Liar’s paradox. Think of this. How can you know that the senses lie, but by futher reports from your senses? We know our knowledge is fallible that our language is defective by further knowledge, by the same defective mechanisms which we have at our disposal. We know that the snapshot is incomplete? Or is that but another snapshot?

— In order to share it you must construct a model, which is an artificial absolute that depends on ambiguity.
Every human cocnept and word is an artificial absolute.
O- I agree. But that means that even the idea that the Real is in constant change, Flow, Flux, depending on whom you ask, is itself but another human concept, another artificial absolute. Proofs, for or against, which are asked, will be but further constructs, artificial, arbitrary, which cannot give us but another artificial absolute. Proof, or lack thereof, is in the eye of the beholder, a finite and particular eye that cannot escape the confines, the limits of it’s scope.

— Take the #1, for example. Mathematics being another language.
The #1 is an artificial absolute.
O- I agree. The idea of God, let us add, might be just like the #1 just another artificial creation of the human mind. I have not denied this. My point is that the vices of theism are found in mathematics as well. An atheist mathematician has simply a different god which he does not recognize. Theism is the most natural of human dispositions, and I don’t mean by theism solely the belief in God but the belief in going beyond our scope, beyond our relative position and finding the power behind the scenes, the Logos, the Forms, The God etc, etc, it does not matter what the name is but what the function is and you’ll find that the function is to order, to reveal patterns, as in religion, so in mathematics.

— There is no singularity anywhere in human experience. The human mind cosntructs singularities in order to find patterns and makle sense of the world.
O- I agree. My point is that even though I agree, I must be honest and tell you that even this might just be but another construct.

— The fact that I can say #1 or use it to covney an idea or to construct a bridge does not prove the existence of a #1.
O- I agree. You can say the same about a law of physics. Yet not all mathematicians, nor all physicists, are Christian are they? The same factor that validates the atheists’ endeavours validates the theists’ endeavours. Nothing has been proved and yet everything is proved! Nothing has objectively been proved, but subjectively, to reason, all is proved. Math is but a tool, just like logic, whose propositions lead to inevitable conclusions but never give proof about the propositions, the axioms, themselves. What is validated is a consistent relation between ideas. Yet what does reason have but it’s ideas? What do theists and atheists alike have but their ideas? The existence of God then, to tie this to our discussion, cannot be objectively proved or disproved, and either atheism or theism as well as the mathematician and logician take their conclusions as absolute based on faith in their propositions, axioms, which are but their own ideas, particular, artificial, and fallible.

— It only proves that these human cosntruct, these abstractions, are sufficient enough to interpret existence, partially and within a certain context.
O- You’ve made the theist best argument. Not the Christian, but the theist, who would say that the idea of…(place here any idea about a Higher Being or Higher Order of Things)…though a human construct, though an abstraction which may be entirely different from what our finite minds are capable of comprehending, it is still sufficient to interpret existence, our existence, partially within a certain context. The idea of God, if nothing else, gives human life meaning-- that is: Context. Is it true? Is it Real? Can I be sure that it is not some delusion? No affirmation can be given, but neither a negation based on the preceeding arguments we have accepted or agreed upon.

— If I did not construct or use a common cosntruction of artificial absolutes, then this communication would be impossible.
O- I agree. “Rational grounds” would be impossible too. Even the identification of a lack of absolutes is impossible without taking as absolute something else.

— Also consider the human mind, the phenomenon of an emerging self, as a resistance to constant entropic decay and fragmentation.
O- When considering the “human mind” you are performing the same trick as the Christian or theist. The “human mind” is never in view of a particular mind. The particular mind, rather, perceives only itself.

— The Natural Laws man invents are percieved patterns within the flux which hold true within the given time period in question.
O- I agree.

— Physicists tell us that even the forces of nature have fragmented when once they were one.
O- Monotheists tells us that there is one God when once they had many other gods. Yet, in both cases, the same method is used that leads to the belief in many laws or in one law or in many gods or in one god.

— You’ve taken the mental models, the human mind uses, literally and from there eroneously projected a hopeful underlying non-existence.
O- Are you telling me, the theist, the physicist, the mathematician or the Philosopher? Perhaps the entire human race? Reason? The accusation applies to all of these “individuals”.

— The only thing a man can do is to honetly and courageously study his experience.
O- What? By doing this a man can hope not to do what the “human mind” does, according to you, which is to errorneously project hopeful fantasies of his own creation?

— What does man see or perceive suing his senses?
Constant flow. Constant change. Constant activity/movement.
That is what existence is.
O- It does not follow that what this man sees is at the same time what actually IS. It takes faith to make the jump from the particular to the general. He, and he alone “sees” change. To him, and him alone, does Reality, Existence become what he sees. To him it seems like all changes and thus he reports that reality is all change. But he reports on how things, how reality, seems like to him, but it does not follow that he is correct in his observations, or that his senses report what IS the case and are free from error, from illusion. A man in a hot desert reports that there is a lake just ahead in the sand. Does that mean that there is a lake in the sand, or that that is just what it seems like from a certain, and arbitrary, perspective?

— To assume a stastic underlying it is to project into the world what there is no evidence for and no need for. It is to inject a cotnradiction.
O- You speak of motion, of change…you speak of this being the perception of essenses. I am going to leave this fantasy alone. We do not assume a static- we are it. A train with no windows, is in motion. There is a passenger aboard and a by stander next to the train-tracks. Who perceives the motion of the train?

— But this is easy because the very nature of consciousness depends on constructing stable, artifices, mental models and abstractions so as to function.
O- And this too could be nothing but another mental model.

— This is where the error occures.
O- We are not infallible.

— The mental models are not reality, they are representations, like the snapshot, of reality and should be considered only as such.
O- Which is how we should approach even this discussion. The Flow you speak of, is it not a mental model? Is it not another representation, another snapshot, and as such, not reality by necessity?

— Whether they are accurate or effective representations, or useful ones, or not is determnied by the particular mind’s ability to incorporate within them as much detail as possible.
The simpler mind simplifies more than the more complicated mind and so the complicated mind, the more sophisticated mind, can construct more precise, useful models.
O- The utility of the model does not equate to the reality of the model. A lucky coincidence is explanatory enough.

— Models that to a simpler mind may appear confusing or self-contradicting or over-geenralizations or chaotic or non-sensical, just as the mental models of a simpler mind appear childish and naive and ignorant.
this is the very definition of nitelligence: The ability to accurately construct detailed abstractions and project them in time.
This is why it is said that the greatest minds in history are timeless. Their awareness was not cotnained by their geographical and temporal existence.
They perceived patterns that hold true, still.
Will they hold true forever?
No.
O- I agree.

— The very nature of the flux estalbishes a cosntant fragmentation demanding a more and more sophisticated mind. This is why life must adapt by evolving more and more sophisticated organisms. Superorganisms.
O- Do you ever think by yourself or do you ape Nietzsche day and night?

— When I say ‘There are no absolutes’ I am cosntructing an artificial model to explain the experience of existence.
O- No. Of your own particular existence.

— It is a simple model, but more sophisticated than the average.
O- Sophisticated does not equal objectivity.

— If I do not do this I cannot even speak.
O- I agree.

— How do I convey my ideas without cosntructing a symbol for the mental models in my mind?
O- You cannot. The virtue of symbols is their absolute character which allow them to effectively and sufficiently “carry” your mental models, or simply contents. “We” are dependent on artificial absolutes. The Self is fragmentary, but the “I” creates an artificial absolute value that transcends this moment in time. This identity, this self, this absolute, the “I”, is necessary before any observation can be made and put into models, to use, construct and control. This absolute must be in place before we can perceive and thus, we, thanks to this absolute and unchangeable myth, for we are not as solid as the idea of an “I” might pretend, are then able to observe change. I can go further and explain here that the self is not a solid, or an actual absolute and that all just might be in motion but that, if so, not everything moves at the same velocity or speed. This would have to be a feature of Nature that allows a slower moving observer to perceive change in a faster moving Other. As to whether everything changes we can then say that everythinbg changes but at different rates of speed or else no one would know what moves or not. However, that said, which is the best argument I can make for your position, I must add that the Universe is vast and we have not seen it all to say what it’s contents are. I speak only on what we have seen so far. Neither have I seen the microcosm that lie beyond the range of microscopes. Will I find there everything in motion? And even though I see motion, I see it by virtue of what is static. “Static” here could mean simply “slower than”, but it makes us wonder just how slow something must go before being declared “at reast” (this is the subjective aspect of both the perception of rest or the perception of motion as well as the perception of change and the perception of permanence).
Now does theism or Christianity depend on the existence of a Permanent Reality? Or, is God free of all change? Or is God part of the Flux, the Flow etc, etc. I believe that we’ve made a great deal of change, but the theist nor the Christian need to prove any fixidity because God acts in time. If God experienced NO CHANGE there would be no creation. Exploring the nature of reality as always changing does not threaten the theistic belief in a God. As far as causality is concerned, we might, by accepting the proposition of a flowing reality that is eternal, with no beginning and no end, eliminate the need to posit a creator; but what we do in fact is simply change the level of God, or shift the attributes of God, from God to Nature. If Reality is ever flowing, God might be considered as doing just that as well. Some theist even hold that God is a verb, action, eternal change and theology can posit that belief in God is nothing but the belief in change. If God was not subject to change, what hope would belief in God bring? So, the case against theism will not be served by a case for constant change, Flow or Flux.[/b]

— No absolute was offered as evidence of the existence of such a concept, no beginnings and no end could be empirically justified, and why this beyond is not included in the concept of the universe is not explained.
O- I don’t have to offer an absolute. Your humanity does. Reason and it’s concepts are the children of the very thing you want “proof” for. The evidence of absolutes is then your very Reason.

— Furthermore what consciousness is, what intelligence is and why a perfect entity creates are not explained.
O- I am not interested in metaphysics, or explaining what I cannot observe as if I did. It would take a lot of faith to believe what I could say about what consciousness “is” or what “intelligence” “is”, and I never, in my answers, spoke about a “perfect entity” and even if I had, I would not even try to give you evidence for the nature or character of a given entity when I cannot even give evidence for the nature of character of another human being.

— You, and your kind
O- Who is my “kind”?

— have failed repeatedly to offer a single rational and well-thought out argument.
O- See above.

— No evidence is to be found
O- Faith needs no evidence and the same evidence is wanting in mathematics as well as science and human language. Human Reason cannot find any evidence, for any system, unless it believes in some things already unquestionably.

— and your reasoning is circular and based on emotional criteria.
O- Human reason is circular and is based on emotional criteria. You said this much above.

— All you have is this ambiguous document that often contradicts itself and uses childish magic to explain the world.
O- I am not a Christian. Theism is not contingent on the contents of any set of Scriptures.

— I asked for a simple definition for the concept of existence, because it plays a central part in your mythology and the closest I got to a straight answer was ‘That which IS’.
O- Did I give you that answer? No I did not. What do you understand by “existence”? What do you mean by saying “I am”? Let see how well you define the actual meaning of “existence”?

— This is the kind of reasoning behind Theistic thinking. It exemplifies its qualities and reveal that it isn’t thought but felt and inherited.
O- Oh I agree 100%. Belief in gods, God, spirits, charms, lucky socks etc, is not something that is arrived by Reason but by feeling. And what Reason has not erected, Reason will not destroy. Why are people so worried about evolution or about science? Because they believe with their Reason, not with their hearts. Their so-called Christian faith is a calculation. How God created the world is the product of human reason, thus easily challenged and destroyed by science which is but sublime reason. However accepting evolution does not destroy what was irrational, which is the belief in a power behind, in an explainable, intelligible universe that can be controlled.

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There are no absolutes. Agreed. There are constants. These are our only bearings in a maelstrom of impersonal changes.

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It does not if you factor in that this is the closest the mind can come to understanding its own state and if you factor in that the absolute is what is missing and attempted.
Each human interpretation is an attempt to establish an absolute where non-exists. It is an ordering in the disordering.

This too is a hypothetical meant to establish a universal truth.
It is an interpretation of the constant flow. Because understanding requires to order things, it establishes a fixed point so as to get its bearings.
The word contradicts itself because a word is a symbol of a mental abstraction trying to encapsulate the human condition.
Th phrase :“There are no absolutes” is the absolute. It’s metaphorical meaning relates to the experience.

Yes.

The mind produces a series of snapshots, stream-of-thought consciousness, dependent on the synaptic speed of the brain.
It is intelligence that takes these abstractions, incorporates them into models and then projects them so as to predict by finding patterns in them.
You can be conscious and not be intelligent. In fact the els intelligent you are the more able you are to exist within a shorter time-frame; to be in the moment, as they say.

Yes, but the “eye of the beholder” does not escape reality by simply beholding otherwise.
The perspective is succesful or not by how closely it can simplify and generalize its sensual stimulations and project them, using the imagination, accurately.

You are assuming that all perspectives are created equal or that man’s interpretations are not comparable to a flow, he mirrors, but must also adhere to.

Yes, a construct is judged by its incorporation of details and its usage as a predicting mechanism.

No, you are using Perspectivism to make every human concept equally valid, based on the fact that we all don’t know, or could never know, for certain.
Perspectivism simply states that each mind is condemned to exist within its own abstractions. But not all abstractions, as not all minds, are created equal.
You are assuming the reality is a human invention, when it is only the interpretations that are constructs.

A man you is convinced that he can jump off a ten story building and fly has created an interpretation of reality in accordance with his mental qualities, experiences and brain dynamics/structures. This does not mean that he will fly, why?

The usage of ignorance to establish a possibility is the theists argument. I use gnosis to establish a probability.
Using the theistic positions you can argue the existence of anything and everything.

I, for one, am not saying reality is a fraud or an illusion. I’m saying that the interpretations of reality can be flawed and that reality is not static. But this non-static reality does not imply that no patterns can be found in it or that fragmentation is happening at such a rate where no general tenets cannot be found to apply within a given time period.
The mind is always playing catch-up, and as entropy increases this is becoming more and more difficult.
This is why we see a continuous creation of more complicated unities.

I see life, or these temporary unities we call organisms, as a resisting phenomenon. The mind tries to establish an absolute.
The absolute is the mind trying to arrest the flow and construct a perfection.

Using ignorance you cannot prove a possibility.

The human mind perceives by gathering stimulations outside itself.
Reality is not constructed in a vacuum using the imagination.
Not everything I can imagine is real.
Imagination is the usage of these abstractions to project self into that which is perceived.
The power of the imagination is determined by self-knowledge, and the degree of detail in the abstractions constructed by the mind of the other.

Solipsism does not prove God. This is a self-referencing loop that assumes that nothing exists outside the interpreting mind.

Scientists or any honest mind, deals with probabilities and theories not with absolutes.

No it doesn’t.
again you are equating the interpretations and motives of all, in an attempt to make all possibilities probable.

It’s unfortunate that there is a standard with which we measure our interpretations of reality and that is the real world.
The world is not static but neither is it a complete chaotic mess. It exhibits some consistency, within a time period. Otherwise we wouldn’t even be here to wonder about it. That we exists tells us that there is a temporary consistency or the flux is not occurring at such a rate as to inhibit any ordering. That we can exchange ideas and interact, at all, tells us that we exist within a common reality.

When I say study I mean compare it and test it.

Man interprets reality and then lives or dies by the quality of these interpretations.
Man is not exempt from reality. He is a product of it and so he mirrors the very processes and phenomena he studies.
Know Thyself.

your desire to make all perspectives equally valid is based on the error that man constructs reality rather than that he interprets it.

A mental model, I repeat, is constructed by using sensual stimulations and then projecting them.
There is soemthing that stimulates and something that it is projected upon.

Using your solipsist opinions everything is probable.

It is a snapshot of a process we both experience and are determined by.

What?
Lucky?
Luck is what the weak mind uses to explain what it is incapable of explaining.
To a primitive mind a fire is a lucky coincidence or spirits dancing on the wood.

I haven’t read Nietzsche in 5 years.
If you insult me again, there will be repercussions.
Trying to remain civil to the simple is had enough without them projecting their insecurities and ill deserved arrogance upon me.
You pathetic imbecile, your attempt to use Perspectivism to justify a belief in the absurd is telling.
Believing in fairies can also be justified using your obtuse reasoning.
If you wish for reality to not exist so that you can continue living in your imagined one, then be advised that the only reason you can is because you exist within a human construct that sheltered you from your own stupidity.

I have tried to remain polite to your feeble meanderings but your recent comment tells me I have offered you too much respect.
Tell me who do you ape?

Then tell me about yours.
What color is the sky in your reality? Can you make it change colors?
Why not?

Not does unsophisticated equal it. It approaches it even less.

In a nutshesll, you prefer the term God because it implies an intelligence that gives a shit about you.
How pathetically continent.
No omnipotent omniscient God then, just as long as you have something soft to fall on.

Once again you are equating the perceivable with the imagined.
You cannot escape reality by denying it and then placing comforting imagination as your only argument.

Once more you are attempting to equate probabilities evoking some common ignorance.
According to you not even Santa Clause can be excluded from the pantheon of probabilities.

How do you determine reliability?

Again, using the method of leveling all in equality.
No, not all minds are as subjective as yours.

Then it is contingent on ignorance and the eradication of reality, claiming that if all is an abstraction, an equally detailed and sophisticated abstraction, then all is equally probable and yours wins on the benefit that it offers you a breast to suckle upon.

How does it feel to be so weak?

Evasion.
i have given my definition of existence on many occasions and in many threads.

Now your turn.

Behind what?
You just made the case that all is equally the product of the human mind.

What universe do you speak of, then?
What is behind the word ‘all’?
Does not the behind imply inclusion within the all? If so then how can one create himself?

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Although it’s not necessarily 100% in-line with OP, I feel like writing a bit about “absolute”.

I think most humans are obsessed about “absolutes”.

Science is obsessed about absolute concreteness (in given system).
Religions are often based on the (fake) absolute god, (mostly irrational and logically wrong) idea of absolutes are key elements in their belief system.
And most people are (subconsciously) implying absoluteness in their daily declaration and evaluations, as if it’s normal.

I see these as the indication that we have (possibly and probably) hardwired inclination towards seeking and assuming absolute, although it remains somehow in the subconscious level in most people.

Now, when I examine what kind of thing we are seeking as “absolutes”, I think we are seeking something without any boundary, limit, condition, etc.
Logically speaking, as the premises confine and bind the result of evaluation within the limitations of that premises, I think “absolutes” must be free of premises.
It means “absolutes” cannot be logically affirmed/declared/evaluated/defined.
It means the total lack of all attributes/property/quality/quantity is the only possibly way to describe the kind of “absolutes” we are obsessed, in my opinion.

So, “absolute” cannot be said “to exist” nor “not to exist”. as it has nothing to do with the capacity/ability/possibility to “exist”.
“Absolute” is devoid of any possibility. (I’m now using singular expression since “absolute” has nothing to do with plurality, either)
And it might be more suitable to call it “void”, " nothing(ness)", “emptiness”, etc.
I don’t know if nihilists or other philosopher type people associate or equate “absolute” with void/emptiness/nothing(ness), but that’s how I see.

Well, I don’t think it’s so difficult to understand what I 'm saying up to here.
I don’t think so many people would disagree about the nature of “absolute” as the lack of any property, although thee might be some who would ague about the inclination towards absolute or obsession for the absolute.

Strangely, in my case, I feel that the core of myself as soundless, motionless, thoughtless, emptiness/void/nothing(ness), since I was small, and I’m pretty comfortable in this situation, somehow.
And, I realized that the nature of inner void matches that of absolute.

Although absolute can’t be used as the absolute premises to construct absolute logic, it can serve as the absolute measuring stick.
It can’t be used to measure the quality/quantity, but it can be used for detecting false absolutes. :smiley:

In other words, when we become intimate with absolute/nothing(ness)/void, we shall clearly know that all we see, all we do, all we know, all we learn, all we describe, and so on, are NOT absolute but relative/arbitrary/conditional/limited/confined things.

So, I would say it’s somewhat correct to say “There are no absolutes”.
But thee is no “constants”, either. I think thee is a notion of (false) absoluteness in the “constants”, in this case.

And something arbitrary/limited/conditional can’t be the bearing.
I think only sold bearing can be the absolute/nothing(ness).
In my case, that works well, because I see it as my inner nature. :slight_smile:

I think everyone has the void in the core, but not many people seem to be aware of that …
And people tend to hate nothing(ness), too. Weird. It’s absolutely calm and soothing.
It sucks all and nullify. Without it, I can’t possibly digest all the physical sensations I happen to feel.

It’s maintenance free, too. Unlike religion, we don’t have to “pretend” to believe, or learn stupid false dogma.
It’s simply absolute/void/nothing(ness) and free super vacuum cleaner of all stupidities. :laughing:

Oh, by the way, “absolute” has nothing to do “evidence”.
There is no possibility of proving the absolute/void/nothing(ness).

But I can feel it, somehow. I can observe ideas and concepts falling into it, disintegrate and dissipater.
And when they break away, I can observe their how they were constructed.
Mostly, I get to know how arbitrary and superficial they are, my idea or that of others.
And many of them aren’t even logical/rational, but mere products of baseless “associative thinking” not even worth examining their structure.

Lots of junk notions associated with “God” and religion are pretty funny.
They have no chance before the absolute/void/nothing(ness). They are gone like dusts, as soon as they come. :slight_smile:

5

The author grabs onto the word ‘absolute’ like a child.

Then he constructs this ‘The absoluteness of not absolute’ argument.

Let me provide alternative words for the term absolute.

Absolute: Perfect, Stable, Complete.

Now his sentence fails to have the same effect as the sentence: ‘The absoluteness of no absolute’ .
‘The completeness of non-completeness’.
‘The perfection of non-perfection.’
‘The stability of the non-stability’.

This individual has seized upon a verbal phenomenon to posit a contradiction.

Then he attempts to use the human condition which is forced to exists within subjective interpretations of the objective to equate all perspectives as being equally probable and so making his own no less likely, even though it lacks all rational and empirical evidence.

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Edit: Double post.

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Yea, but he was asking for it.

9

^^ Yeah. I really didn’t have a point, it was just vaguely tied to the discussion and I thought you’d think it was funny.

10

I did think it was funny.

11

Satyr:

— It does not if you factor in that this is the closest the mind can come to understanding its own state and if you factor in that the absolute is what is missing and attempted.
O- It does because I do factor in those conditions: What is attempted is indeed what remains missing, hence the dilema of attempting to say what you say that cannot be said.

— Each human interpretation is an attempt to establish an absolute where non-exists.
O- Is each human interpretation, absolutely and invariably an attempt or is this also a conditioned interpretation? That is the point. When you say “each” or “is” or “is not”, these are absolutes- there is no ambiguity, no vacillation or qualification to represent a possible interpretation or theoretical attempt at an interpretation but a declaration of what is.

— It is an ordering in the disordering.
O- That is what the mind does. That is what the senses do. We cannot get away from this.

— This too is a hypothetical meant to establish a universal truth.
O- Regardless how does the hypothetical become universal truth? Leap of Faith. The universal truth is established not so much by the virtue of the hypothesis but by faith in the possibility of conclusions, or that we can “see” beyond the now. Universal truth is another name for “God”.

— It is an interpretation of the constant flow. Because understanding requires to order things, it establishes a fixed point so as to get its bearings.
O- If the flow is constant there would be no way for fixing anything outside of faith. Even the constant nature of the flow is a matter of faith.

— The word contradicts itself because a word is a symbol of a mental abstraction trying to encapsulate the human condition. Th phrase :“There are no absolutes” is the absolute. It’s metaphorical meaning relates to the experience.
O- The word always encapsulates the individual’s condition- only faith can make his condition the same as the human condition. Very democratically, my condition can be considered the same as the “human” condition because all humans are equal and I am a human being. I don’t think that you agree with this lowering of all standards.

— Yes.
O- And then you accuse me of solipsism…

— The mind produces a series of snapshots, stream-of-thought consciousness, dependent on the synaptic speed of the brain.
It is intelligence that takes these abstractions, incorporates them into models and then projects them so as to predict by finding patterns in them.
O- Yes.

— You can be conscious and not be intelligent.
O- Depends on how you define “intelligent”. Taking abstractions and incorporating them into models and then project them so as to predict by finding patterns in them, i.e. “intelligence” as described by you above, needs no more intelligence than a Pavlov’s dogs.

— In fact the els intelligent you are the more able you are to exist within a shorter time-frame; to be in the moment, as they say.
O- Yes. Less apt to conditioning.

— Yes, but the “eye of the beholder” does not escape reality by simply beholding otherwise.
The perspective is succesful or not by how closely it can simplify and generalize its sensual stimulations and project them, using the imagination, accurately.
O- So, the perspective, that the only absolute is absolute flow, is “succesful” because it simplifies and generalizes subjective sensations, stimulations, enough to allow the imagination (I say faith) to project them… I can agree that our imagination generalizes and then projects it’s imagined conclusions, but I don’t think that what we admitedly have imagined need to be objectively accurate. The involvement of the imagination is not at an end with the successful projection of imagined system into the flow of reality but in imagining as well the accuracy of the hypothesis which places a prejudice about what we think, or imagine that we see. People see what they want to see. And they all think or imagine that what they see they see accurately.

— No, you are using Perspectivism to make every human concept equally valid
O- No. I don’t mean to deny judgment but to demonstrate the limits of a fallible judgment, which is that it can never be certain, since there are no absolutes in fact but only in theory, in our fallible imagination. If there are concepts that are valid and some others which are unvalid this would deny the aforementioned that there exists no absolutes. If there are no absolutes at all then we don’t have “human”, first of all, and second of all, what is left, “concepts” would lack universality. There are then unequal constructs but the validity of one over another is not absolutely determined. Doesn’t mean that these constructs are “equally valid” but that we have no absolute standard to test their validity.

— based on the fact that we all don’t know, or could never know, for certain.
O- If we can know for certain then absolutes exist. It’s that simple.

— Perspectivism simply states that each mind is condemned to exist within its own abstractions.
O- I agree. How is this different from solipsism?

— But not all abstractions, as not all minds, are created equal.
O- That is your abstraction. Your myth, your faith.

— You are assuming the reality is a human invention
O- Not an invention but that it is mediated by subjectivity.

— when it is only the interpretations that are constructs.
O- Yet, without the capacity to grasp “reality” all we are left with is our constructs.

— A man you is convinced that he can jump off a ten story building and fly has created an interpretation of reality in accordance with his mental qualities, experiences and brain dynamics/structures. This does not mean that he will fly, why?
O- How did he developed his “mental qualities”? That is the issue. If he is convinced that he can jump off and fly because he has actually done it then it does not affect his ability to do so that I have never done it. If his experience of flight does not go beyong imagining that he could then we just have to wait and see whether he is special of if “all men are created equal” (which you probably will deny).

— The usage of ignorance to establish a possibility is the theists argument. I use gnosis to establish a probability.
Using the theistic positions you can argue the existence of anything and everything.
O- How do you arrive at probability? You talk of all this “flow” but the fact is that ypou speak as if you did not believe it. You say that there are no absolutes but keep acting as if there were. You bring me gnosis and probability neither of which makes much sense in the face of flow. I am not using anything. I am holding your positing to the standards or limitations you have hoisted upon yourself. I have already said that reason requires absolutes. Your probability models require absolutes. If there are no absolutes then anything goes. If Universal truth (God) is dead then everything is permitted (possible) and if not then some absolute standard must exist that regulates what is or is not permitted, (or what is or not probable). The theistic position does not rely simply on the admitance of ignorance because theism can very easily abhor reason. If I believe in some Higher Power it does not mean that I chose to believe or that I believe because I have my reasons to believe. “I don’t know therefore I believe” is not accurate. Or “I know, therefore I believe”. Rather “I am therefore I believe”. It is not adquired. It is innate. It is found in religion but also outside. It is not ignorance or gnosis but being. Some beliefs you think about and some other beliefs you live within. Theism, I say, if the latter.

— I, for one, am not saying reality is a fraud or an illusion.
O- Neither have I, but that it is mediated, grasped from within a cell.

— I’m saying that the interpretations of reality can be flawed and that reality is not static.
O- I have accepted this proposition and erected my entire argument from it.

— But this non-static reality does not imply that no patterns can be found in it or that fragmentation is happening at such a rate where no general tenets cannot be found to apply within a given time period.
O- I can agree on this. This is but faith in the intelligibility of X. Make it “God” and the same exact applies.

— The absolute is the mind trying to arrest the flow and construct a perfection.
O- …as every conception is incomplete by virtue of it’s perfection or complete by virtue of it’s imperfections…

— Using ignorance you cannot prove a possibility.
O- Of course not.

— The human mind perceives by gathering stimulations outside itself.
O- So it tells itself, but what it does perceives is itself. If I see black spots floating around in the room, am I seeing or being stimulated by what is outside of myself? You talked about imagination before. What is the role of the imagination, if any, in the “gathering” of stimulations? The gathering of reality is imperfect but made perfect or coherent enough for human consumption by the harmonization given to the bits and pieces we gather by the imagination. We gather, so to speak, bricks and the imagination serves up the facade and mortar that blends all the bricks together and underneath.

— Reality is not constructed in a vacuum using the imagination.
O- But not without any input from the imagination either. It is not a perfect flow or gathering…

— Not everything I can imagine is real.
O- But not everything that I consider real is reality itself or we could not explain how we can be wrong about a face for example.

— Solipsism does not prove God.
O- I never said it did. NOTHING PROVES GOD and because of the same reason EVERYTHING DOES, because God is not, at least for the theist, adquired knowledge, nor is it ignorance. belief in God does not appear with knowledge or instruction, nor does belief in God (and I don’t mean a Christian God but that Higher and ambiguous Power) disappear through instruction. Therefore for the atheist reality seems to prove that there is no God while the theist, for the same reason, reality, believes that God’s existence is unquestionable. I’ll give you my take: Either conclusion has little to do with reality as it is in itself and everything to do with reality as we individualy apprehend it and through which googles we apprehend it and filter it and edit what then becomes for us “reality”. Belief in God is not found in what is gathered but is found in the means through which we gather. That is, that organizing mind, that imagination, that projecting, all-seeing prophet that sees order and constancy where there is none, where there is only change, trasitiousness. Oh, I agree with you that the flow is not so perverse as to not give us some provisional point of reference so that constructs apply. It is this that allows the minds further vices and the mind takes a foot where only an inch was given. What we want is not provicional applications to our models, but UNIVERSAL TRUTH, eternal application of what is an objective idea directly gathered from the REAL or GOD.

— This is a self-referencing loop that assumes that nothing exists outside the interpreting mind.
O- Oh something does exist and the Christian says that that “something” is called “God”.

— Scientists or any honest mind, deals with probabilities and theories not with absolutes.
O- What is the speed of light constant or probable. Is the light leaving earth just likely to reach the moon in 1 1/2 seconds or will it constantly reach the moon in that span.? If it was just a probability would we say then that light will probably reach the moon generally speaking in 1 1/2 seconds? So how come we do not? Are these scientists being dishonest? Lord forbid!!!

— It’s unfortunate that there is a standard with which we measure our interpretations of reality and that is the real world.
O- The real world is not directly apprehended but mediated, therefore partially influenced by our subjectivity, circumstance. And you keep saying:“we” as if “all men were created equal” that you could speak about what “we” measure. There are no absolutes, therefore there is no “we”.

— The world is not static but neither is it a complete chaotic mess. It exhibits some consistency, within a time period.
O- Yes, yes.

— That we can exchange ideas and interact, at all, tells us that we exist within a common reality.
O- You cannot arrive at this conclusions without absolutes. A common reality would imply a common or objective source of authority or in other words, an absolute. How is it possible that we, we no less, share ideas and exist within the same, or common reality if there are at the same time, no absolutes that we can speak of?

— Man is not exempt from reality.
O- Which “reality”? Because you first said that all is flow, then that there is flow but that not without some permanence, but even so, is this permanence long enough to merit an identity rather than several? “Man”-- an absolute? Reality–another absolute? Which “Man” are we making reference to? All men? Alive as well as dead, chinesse as well as african? Thus a universal idea of man? And what of this “reality” is it reality as it is today, or as it was at the Big Bang or as it might be when we are all dead and gone? It has changed, right, and it will continue to change…so what remains that this name can be attached to? This name “reality” what does it apply to? If flow is true then we cannot speak of “man” or “reality”.

— He is a product of it and so he mirrors the very processes and phenomena he studies.
Know Thyself.
O- And all men are created equal…

— your desire to make all perspectives equally valid is based on the error that man constructs reality rather than that he interprets it.
O- Again, I am not saying that Real is entirely what we imagine, but that Real is not independent of what we imagine. Reality is a pretty big concept and as such we have room for all sorts of things to happen. In certain situations, hot situations, the mind does very little interpretation and is a receipient of reality. In other situations, cold situations, very little is given by reality and thus a man’s imagination completes reality and fills the gaps with what he can imagine. Theory is then apply to reality and a lucky coincidence is enough to turn a vain imagination into “Law” that transcends his time.

— A mental model, I repeat, is constructed by using sensual stimulations and then projecting them.
There is soemthing that stimulates and something that it is projected upon.
O- Then there is an absolute “it” that acts upon us and is acted upon as well. But you said there are no absolutes…

— Using your solipsist opinions everything is probable.
O- If there are no absolutes then everything is possible or probable but if there are absolutes then not everything is possible or probable.

— The simpler mind simplifies more than the more complicated mind and so the complicated mind, the more sophisticated mind, can construct more precise, useful models.
O- The utility of the model does not equate to the reality of the model. A lucky coincidence is explanatory enough.
What?
Lucky?
Luck is what the weak mind uses to explain what it is incapable of explaining.
O- The capability to explain resides in the adoption or admission of absolutes which you have denied. What do you have but luck now?

— To a primitive mind a fire is a lucky coincidence or spirits dancing on the wood.
O- …The release of energy is just how these spirits dance…modern mind is still primitive.

— I haven’t read Nietzsche in 5 years.
If you insult me again, there will be repercussions.
O- Am I supposed to be afraid? That was no insult. The time passed between readings does nothing to dilute the influence of Nietzsche in your writings in my opinion. That is not an insult but an observation based on the attitude of your text.

— Trying to remain civil to the simple is had enough without them projecting their insecurities and ill deserved arrogance upon me.
O- You vanity is no picnic either.

— You pathetic imbecile
O- I see why this tread was placed in the Rant House.

— your attempt to use Perspectivism to justify a belief in the absurd is telling.
Believing in fairies can also be justified using your obtuse reasoning.
O- Just fairies? My dear moron, it can be used to justify belief in lucky socks or in a theory of evolution.

— If you wish for reality to not exist so that you can continue living in your imagined one, then be advised that the only reason you can is because you exist within a human construct that sheltered you from your own stupidity.
O- Thank you Morpheus for revealing what is absolutely “Real” to me.

— Tell me who do you ape?
O- No single one.

— Then tell me about yours.
O- I have, but you must apply yourself.

— What color is the sky in your reality?
O- Grey. So?

— Can you make it change colors?
O- I don’t want to make it change colors, but it might change colors against my will without me knowing. If I become sick the sky may seem a different hue, a different color but I may not even realize that what I see is not what actually is.

— Why not?
O- Because I am not God.

— Not does unsophisticated equal it. It approaches it even less.
O- The accuracy or nearness is relative to the observer if there are no absolutes as you say.

— In a nutshesll, you prefer the term God because it implies an intelligence that gives a shit about you.
O- Have I said that God gives a shit or that theism depends on believing in God’s benevolence. God could give a shit about you but that does not mean that you cannot be a theist. I never said that God is Good or that He or It was Bad. That It was even interested in shit like us. Does an Unmoved Mover gives a shit? No.

— No omnipotent omniscient God then, just as long as you have something soft to fall on.
O- Now we get to YOUR problem with God. You have lost your faith which you once had because you won’t take or settle for any god that is less than omnipotent or omniscient. Such god is no god. And god must be soft. If it is hard then you won’t have anything to do with it. How Christian…

— According to you not even Santa Clause can be excluded from the pantheon of probabilities.
O- Nothing can be excluded without imposing an absolute.

— How do you determine reliability?
O- Through absolutes which you say don’t exist.

— Again, using the method of leveling all in equality.No, not all minds are as subjective as yours.
O- Without absolutes, how could I know?

— Then it is contingent on ignorance and the eradication of reality
O- Reality cannot be known if there are no absolutes.

— claiming that if all is an abstraction, an equally detailed and sophisticated abstraction
O- depends on the arbitrary nature of abstraction not on whether the abstractions are sophisticated or not.

— then all is equally probable and yours wins on the benefit that it offers you a breast to suckle upon.
O- That is the inevitable consequence of the premise that says that there are NO ABSOLUTES.

— How does it feel to be so weak?
O- I don’t know. I would have to ask you. You started like a lion and now you hide like a mouse behind this “reality”.

— Evasion. i have given my definition of existence on many occasions and in many threads. Now your turn.
O- You have given it before but not to me.

— Behind what?
O- The apparent- the flow to get to what is “reality”. What lies behind is absolute.

— You just made the case that all is equally the product of the human mind.
O- No, YOU DID. There are no absolutes…this is YOUR idea. Now live up to it’s consequences.

— What universe do you speak of, then?
O- My own, of course, if there are no absolutes.

— What is behind the word ‘all’?
O- An idea.

— Does not the behind imply inclusion within the all?
O- Of the observer, yes.

— If so then how can one create himself?
O- Though Faith.

12

I just did and you understood.

That’s your word for it because you also want it to be intelligent and conscious. Intelligence and cosnciousness are products of an absence not creators of it.
Besides entropy implies that universal truth is constantly changing.

Keep praying.

All humans are “equal”? another declaration contradicted by reality.
How does evolution work?

— You can be conscious and not be intelligent.
O- Depends on how you define “intelligent”. Taking abstractions and incorporating them into models and then project them so as to predict by finding patterns in them, i.e. “intelligence” as described by you above, needs no more intelligence than a Pavlov’s dogs.
[/quote]
And what makes you different than a dog?

And then reality decides.

Except reality, that doesn’t give a shit how we interpret it.

Because it does not discount a real world that we either interpret correctly or we don’t.

And you, my example.

And? This means that your God exists because you believe it?

We do graps reality. We just don’t do it completely.
Trying to use ignorance to defend your absurdities will not work.

Huh?
Will he fly simply because he believes it?
Let me simplify it for you.

Not all beliefs are created equal.
some are backed up by evidence, empiricism and an honest amount of skepticism.

Still evading your repsonsibilities, I see.

You just can’t help yourself. You need this.
Have you answered anything?

13

One more thing.

You’ve latched onto the word ‘absolute’ like a drowning man to a deflating life-raft.

Please provide a definition to the word, since I suspect we might be using it differently.

Then offer alternative words that denote the same concept.
God, is one but offer some more.
I would also say perfect, stable, one, singularity.

Then offer me what you would consider to be the characteristics of an absolute.

Then tell me what the difference, if any, between these two sentences:

[b]A dog exists.

A unicorn exists.[/b]
Then explain why, if at all, one is an absurd statement while the other is not.

Finally explain how evolution works in a world where everyone is equal.

14

Satyr:

— I just did and you understood.
O- Did I understand or is that another absolute you take on faith?
Satyr remember that I already distinguished between modes of apprehension. Sometimes ambiguity, which you should acknowledge as the prophet of Flow, is minimal and sometimes it is there until we “fix” it by the fiat of faith.

— That’s your word for it because you also want it to be intelligent and conscious.
O- No, that is my word for it because I am trying to show you the similarities between each apparently disimilar pursuit for “Truth”.

— Besides entropy implies that universal truth is constantly changing.
O- And so does the Bible. Entropy is a jewish idea. From perfection, the Graden of Eden to our world, our Fallen world. And God? Constantly Changing? Who knows…but if God could not change what would be the use of prayer? Before you misunderstand me, I am not speaking to you from a monotheistic perspective. I am showing you how that perspective is in accord in it’s opinion of reality. Science and religion differ here in the how that reality came to be. The Origins of reality.

— All humans are “equal”? another declaration contradicted by reality.
O- Contradicted by reality? Exactly how? If we are unequal, in all respects, then there is no “we”. There is language either, nor any “humans”. No objectivity, no absolutes.

— How does evolution work?
O- I might ask you how does “language” works at this time since we are not created equal? Explain this piccolo miracle.

— And what makes you different than a dog?
O- A higher degree.

— Because it does not discount a real world that we either interpret correctly or we don’t.
O- Are there absolutes standards, then, which could decide what is correct or incorrect? You said there were none, now imply that there are are. The only constant here is your inconsistence.

— And? This means that your God exists because you believe it?
O- No. “God” is how we mediate. God need not be Yahweh or Allah or some god in the pagan pantheon. God need not be what I pray to, or what I hope for when I am sick or dying. God is the underlying structure, imagined or real, we suppose exist and which is the nature of reality. God is that Logos, The Laws of Nature, Reality which is then studied and understood and which we aim our structures, our “interpretations”, at. “God” is that which judges between different interpretations. For you this God has now the name:“Reality”. It is not invented by man (how theistic!), it does not care about what men think, but decides between man and man whose interpretation is correct.

— We do graps reality. We just don’t do it completely.
O- Change the word “reality” for “God” and you just repeated what St Paul said in his epistles…It does not matter that we grasp some part of reality. The point is that if we only grasp part of reality, then how can a mangled idea of reality serve as an absolute standard, or a standard period.

— Not all beliefs are created equal.
O- Are some beliefs infallible? But I agree…not all beliefs are equal. Some become convictions.

— some are backed up by evidence, empiricism and an honest amount of skepticism.
O- Evidence is in the eye of the beholder- another interpretation that refers to other interpretations, never able to escape it’s own subjectivity.

— Still evading your repsonsibilities, I see.
O- No, I am showing you the consequences of your childish attempt at a philosophy where there are no absolutes. I have cornered you into defending the very thing you denied existed. It is not me who is evading his responsibilities but you, Satyr, who is trying to escape the consequences of your logic.

— You’ve latched onto the word ‘absolute’ like a drowning man to a deflating life-raft.
O- And you to “reality” as an absolute that exist.

— Please provide a definition to the word, since I suspect we might be using it differently.
O- “Absolute” is that which would be needed to make a definition or to even request a definition, but you say that does not exist, so I cannot define it for you.

— Then offer alternative words that denote the same concept.
O- No. There is a point being made by my use of the word “God”. And why should I give any new words when you have already given this discussions so many new synonyms?

— God, is one but offer some more.
I would also say perfect, stable, one, singularity.
O- Then I would ask: Is Reality perfect or imperfect? Stable or unstable? One or many? Singular or fragmented?

— Then offer me what you would consider to be the characteristics of an absolute.
O- The chief characteristic, in my opinion, of an absolute is it’s ultimacy.

— Then tell me what the difference, if any, between these two sentences:

A dog exists.

A unicorn exists.
Then explain why, if at all, one is an absurd statement while the other is not.
O- You are confident about the ultimacy of one above the other. But this starts and ends with YOU, not with some Reality you can barely grasp.

— Finally explain how evolution works in a world where everyone is equal.
O- Not until you explain how language can work in a world where everyone (how is there even an “everyone”???) is unequal? The answer is stated in the question.

15

Faith does nothing but maintain ambiguity. It actually depends on it. Once you delve deeper you see how pathetic and absurd blind faith is.

How would you measure truth?

How would you know if it’s reality?

Another declaration. And, yet, there WE are.
How is there competition or movement at all if all is equal?
Survival of the fittest implies that there are degrees of fitness.

“Miracle”?
Language works because there’s a shared reality which we intepret and symbolize, using words.

Then you are not equal to a dog.

You just don’t get it.
Replace the word absolute with perfect.
Reality in ongoing but the laws man uses to explain it are based on aptterns which exhibit consistency.
This consistency isn’t eternal. It is temporary.

The only cosntant is your simplicity.

No, God implies an intelligence, omnipotent, omniscience that exists outside the time/space continuum, in other words does not exist.

Really, so the evidence that wood burns is up for interpretation?
An opinion is deemed more probable when you can use it to make predictions.

I am trying to forgive your simplicity, but it is difficult.

When I say there are no ghosts I am denying an existence not positing the existence of an absolute non-existence.
Otherwise all my denials would be absolutes.
Are you retarded?

Simpleton, your verbal acrobatics are insufficient.
Define the word which you posit as existing.

Another evasion.
You really don’t know what the hell you are talking about.

Unstable, imperfect. You as a product of reality mirror this. In your case you are more unstable and imperfect than the average.

What? What does that mean?
Do you even give direct explanations?
Still trying to pretend that you actually know what you are talking about.

So, for you a dog may not exist?
Reality is arbitrary? You decide to see it in whichever way makes you feel good?

How thick are you?

Sharing a biology and methods of communication does not make us equal. Similarity is different to equality.
Language is an agreed upon symbolic method of exchanging thoughts.

At this point I’m reconsidering my participation in this thread.
Too many fools to keep up with and so little time.

16

Hello Satyr…or whomever is left to read this…:

— Faith does nothing but maintain ambiguity. It actually depends on it. Once you delve deeper you see how pathetic and absurd blind faith is.
O- To those who have faith it is not “blind”. Faith develops due to observations, but nature does not measure up to the apprehensions we make of it, which we mediate and correct with our imagination. I would say that at our level, nature produces very few ideal forms. Naturally occuring lines are not the same as geometric lines. They are not as straight in real life as they are in our imagination or apprehension of it. Nature is sensed as having some level of order…it is not total chaos. But the level of order we attach to it will be higher than what it has. The Laws we say it has are without exception and traverse from past to future and to all possible observers even though we are finite beings. This cannot be done without faith. Otherwise you would have to say:“So far…” or “As far as I have seen in my tests…” This is impractical. Faith is not blind. As the apostle Paul said:“We have the mind of God”. Faith is what allow humans to see beyond the scope of the now, of the finite and declare things that lay beyond their senses, but which are suggested to reason by the senses.

— How would you measure truth?
O- What is “truth”? Tell me what you mean by it and I will tell you how it is measured.

— How would you know if it’s reality?
O- The same way scientists “know” that the Big Bang is “real”.

— Another declaration. And, yet, there WE are.
O- Therefore, at some level, we are equal. Language would be impossible otherwise.

— How is there competition or movement at all if all is equal?
O- Not ALL is equal, but at some level we, if there is to be a “we”, must have some level of equality. Not all apples are the same shape, weight or color, but they are nonetheless equally called “apples” because the differences they have are accidental and not essential.

— Survival of the fittest implies that there are degrees of fitness.
O- How Lamarkian. It is rather survival of the lucky.

— Language works because there’s a shared reality which we intepret and symbolize, using words.
O- Reality is shared with dogs yet I fail to understand dogs barking.

— Then you are not equal to a dog.
O- As an organism, I am equal to a dog, to a tree, to whatever else multiplies it’s cells. Equality is a matter of standards. The standard you use will determine the equality between the subjects. If our standard is reason then I am not equal to a dog- AT THAT LEVEL- at that standard. But if the standard used to measure is vitality, life, mode of reproduction, then I might be equal to the dog in that category, in that standard, in that respect.

— You just don’t get it.
Replace the word absolute with perfect.
O- So what you use to measure are imperfect standards, which do exist? How can that standard settle for you and me any disagreement? How can it regulate other than imperfectly?

— Reality in ongoing but the laws man uses to explain it are based on aptterns which exhibit consistency.
O- The patterns are perfected by the human mind. The consistency becomes endemic to the experienced reality to the point in which the “Real” drops and what is left is our idea of it. God does not play dice but he constructed his reality mathematically. Mathematics, so definitive in science, cannot reflect the ongoing reality because it’s values (mathematical values) are ideally fixed. One (1) is not “ongoing”. It does not have the possibility of “becoming”. Reality does exhibit consistency…I never denied that, but the consistency of nature is not equal to the consistency of mathematics. The consistency is perfected by the human mind through faith. What it sees constantly it makes into a law of nature, inviolable, fixed, no longer flowing or becoming. The verb becomes a noun, the divine a symbol.

— This consistency isn’t eternal. It is temporary.
O- What gives you that idea other than some constant tendency you have observed?

— The only cosntant is your simplicity.
O- And your consistency is your idiocity. Keep it clean or I’ll retort in kind.

— No, God implies an intelligence, omnipotent, omniscience that exists outside the time/space continuum, in other words does not exist.
O- Let me repeat what I said about this “God” symbol… “God” is how we mediate. God need not be Yahweh or Allah or some god in the pagan pantheon. God need not be what I pray to, or what I hope for when I am sick or dying. God is the underlying structure, imagined or real, we suppose exist and which is the nature of reality. God is that Logos, The Laws of Nature, Reality which is then studied and understood and which we aim our structures, our “interpretations”, at. “God” is that which judges between different interpretations. For you this God has now the name:“Reality”. It is not invented by man (how theistic!), it does not care about what men think, but decides between man and man whose interpretation is correct.

— Really, so the evidence that wood burns is up for interpretation?
O- The question is whether wood has to eternally burn or whether this is only temporary. If eternally, then there is no interpretation.

— An opinion is deemed more probable when you can use it to make predictions.
O- We make predictions through faith that that which has been will be again. We destroy thus whatever becoming may be inherent in Reality as is.

— I am trying to forgive your simplicity, but it is difficult.
O- I know. I have been trying to excuse your stupidity but it is getting hard to do. You are not worth it.

— When I say there are no ghosts I am denying an existence not positing the existence of an absolute non-existence.
O- This has nothing to do with the discussion and shows your level of disattention.

— Otherwise all my denials would be absolutes.

Are you retarded?
O- No, but I am convinced now that YOU ARE.

— Simpleton, your verbal acrobatics are insufficient.
Define the word which you posit as existing.
O- Ignoramous, a definition is contingent on the very thing you say does not exist. We already had established this at the start. Read back and you will find it. I will not re-educate you.

— Another evasion.
O- Just because you ask a stupid question does not mean I have to stoop down to answer it.

— You really don’t know what the hell you are talking about.
O- To a moron like you that may be what it seems. I am sure that higher minds conprehend my meaning.

— What? What does that mean?
Do you even give direct explanations?
Still trying to pretend that you actually know what you are talking about.
O- Are you for real Satyr? I thought too much of you. I shall not make that mistake again. You are a Fraud.

— So, for you a dog may not exist?
O- Depends on what the beholder defines as “dog” and “exist”. Same with Unicorns.

— Reality is arbitrary?
O- Mediated.

— You decide to see it in whichever way makes you feel good?
O- I see it through the colored glass of my subjectivity. And yes, feelings do play a part on what we think we are seeing. Most intelligent people would not need this basic shit to be explained to them.

— Sharing a biology and methods of communication does not make us equal. Similarity is different to equality.
O- What standard is in play defines whether you have mere similarity or equality. All men are not just similarly mortal but equally, without exception, mortal.

— Language is an agreed upon symbolic method of exchanging thoughts.
O- An agreement possible from the recognition that something, some quality, is shared which makes my mind like your mind and what I see, what you see, not similar, but equally.

— At this point I’m reconsidering my participation in this thread.
Too many fools to keep up with and so little time.
O- At this point I could give a flying fuck. You are a Fraud. I thought you had been misjudged, but now I see that you are stupid and incapable of conprehending the most basic of argument styles. I wish you good luck in learning from others above you on this board.