woorden niet, en wat je bezwaar precies was. Ik begrijp ook niet waarom je het woord statuut gebruikt, aangezien dat woord niet voorkomt in de tekst waar je op reageerde. Het leek er sterk op dat je op iets reageerde dat niets met het citaat te maken had.
Daar wees ik toen ook op door aan te geven dat er een belangrijke, systematische (puntsgewijze) uitleg stond op de bladzijden vóór het citaat (getiteld "Circles of Eternity"). Ik had onderschat hoe belangrijk die voorgaande bladzijden waren.
? En bedoelde je dit ook wel rekening houdend met de wet van de toereikende grond? Begreep je wel
Dit was het voorafgaande deel dat ik bedoelde (en nu ik het teruglees besef ik me hoe relevant het is voor onze andere interacties de afgelopen dagen, zoals die met betrekking tot noodzakelijkheid versus oorzaken etc.):
Are you ready to begin? In front of your disbelieving eyes, we are going to use reason alone to account for the entirety of existence. We shall create a 100% rational universe that explains everything you encounter in the world.
Step One: Nothingness
Our first task is to rationally define “nothing at all”. Only then can we start to define what “something” is.
“Nothing at all” has no properties of any kind. It has no mass, energy, speed, extension, dimensionality, location, density, weight, colour, smell, taste, sound, appearance, qualia, consciousness, unconsciousness, or anything else. Is there anything helpful we can utilise that meets this definition? There’s only one possible answer: the static mathematical point. This is “nothing”, “zero”, void, blankness, emptiness. It is nothing and it does nothing. It has no effects, no consequences. It’s as if it’s not there at all, and indeed, it isn’t there at all. This is pure zero, abstract zero, unreal zero, non-ontological zero.
If we can have one nothingness, i.e. one mathematical point, we can have an infinite number. Nothing can prevent nothing. Where one static point is possible, infinite static points are possible. But all we are doing is multiplying nothing. We are merely creating infinite nothingness.
This is the ground state of “reality”. Anyone who wants to explain the reality we observe must explain why there is more than just this infinite nothingness. What sufficient reason is there for more than simple nothing? Leibniz famously asked why there is something rather than nothing.
Mathematically, this equates to asking what could be legitimately, rationally added to nothing at all, without violating the principle of sufficient reason, i.e. without creating an arbitrary add on to nothing that we could never justify.
If nothing is the ground state of reality then anything we add to nothing cannot violate this ground state, i.e. whatever we add must itself be some version of nothing at all, while of course not being nothing at all (because then we could never have “something”).
Only one thing can be added to static points without defying the principle of sufficient reason. That thing is motion. If “nothing” = nonexistence = static mathematical points, then “something” = existence = moving mathematical points. Existence, in other words, is rational, mathematical motion.
But why should a mathematical point move? The answer, naturally, is the principle of sufficient reason itself. If it is possible for a point to move, and there is no sufficient reason for it not to move, then it must move. The only thing that would stop a point from moving is if it violated the zero ground state of the universe.
The principle of sufficient reason does not allow any particular state to be arbitrarily privileged over any other state that satisfies exactly the same conditions. Thus, there is no sufficient reason for a static universe of absolute nothingness if a dynamic universe of somethingness can just as readily satisfy exactly the same requirement for the universe never to exceed a ground state energy of precisely zero forever.
There is nothing special about absolute nothingness. It is no more fundamental than any other state that necessarily obeys the compulsory ground state energy of zero of the universe.
Every state that satisfies the ground state energy of the universe will and must exist since there is nothing to prevent it. Moreover it will exist necessarily and eternally. Every such state is part of the permanent fibre and fabric of existence. This is the framework of the universe, the inherent superstructure and substructure. Everything hangs on this. It fills up existence. There are no gaps at all.
In Leibniz’s system, true substances were “metaphysical” points which, so Leibniz said, were both real and exact, while physical points were real but not exact, and mathematical points were exact but not real.
In modern ontological mathematics, static mathematical points are exact but unreal, while moving mathematical points serve as the basis for both metaphysical points (concerned with minds) and physical points (concerned with matter).
Existence: Certain or Uncertain?
Science claims that reality is shrouded in some sort of inherent uncertainty or indeterminacy, supposedly arising from Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle. Let’s apply the problem of Cartesian substance dualism to uncertainty. How can uncertainty interact with certainty? They have zero in common. Ergo, either the whole of reality is totally uncertain, or the whole of reality is totally certain. Look around. Do you see uncertainty, indeterminacy, fuzziness, haziness, blurriness?
According to science, the macroscopic world is more or less deterministic and certain, while the microscopic world is said to be indeterministic and uncertain. How is that possible? It automatically raises the dilemma of how certainty can interact with uncertainty, determinism with indeterminism, or how one can possibly originate in the other. Science never bothers to address these fundamental issues.
We can abolish all of this alleged uncertainty by appealing to mathematics and zero/infinity mathematical monads.
Science’s absurd claim that the fundamental basis of existence is shrouded in uncertainty, indeterminacy, indeterminism, acausation, statistics and probability is entirely refuted by a rational, rather than empirical, analysis of ontology. It’s impossible for energy to be “borrowed” from some mysterious temporal twilight zone and then rapidly repaid, as science crazily suggests. Science doesn’t even propose any mechanism for this borrowing. It’s imagined to take place as if by magic. Once the miracle happens, scientists nod sagely and say, “Ah, the uncertainty explains it.” They might as well refer to “God” – an equally ridiculous non-explanation that pretends to make sense of things but never rises above the purest nonsense.
Science puts in an enormous effort to explain nothing at all. If you think “uncertainty” is an explanation, you plainly don’t know what an explanation is. “Uncertainty” is what you refer to when you are seeking to hide the gulf in your knowledge, and have no clue what the explanation is.
Existence, in its fundamental aspect, is the most precise and perfect thing you can possibly get. It is absolutely analytic. It has no uncertainty whatsoever. Only mathematics can provide the perfect, precise, unbreakable, absolutely stable, complete and consistent foundations of eternal existence. Any other foundations would instantly destroy themselves, especially any foundations built on “uncertainty”. Have you ever seen a house with “uncertain” foundations? If a house would fall over without stable, certain foundations, think how much more rapidly the universe itself would collapse without such foundations. Indeed, it would never stand at all.
It’s not a question of why there is something rather than nothing. In fact, every state exactly equal to nothing cannot not exist. Even the state of infinite static points can be considered as a special kind of existence, one with absolutely no consequences and no effects, hence which sits permanently in the background, making no difference to anything. It is the state of nothing = nothing, while all other states are something = nothing.
These are all mathematical states. They cannot be any other types of state. The arche, the ultimate substance of existence, is pure, analytic math, exactly equal to zero at all time. Naive religious types have called it “God”, or the Oneness, or the Spirit, or cosmic consciousness, or Will. Empiricists and materialists have rubbished all of that and opted for something much worse... non-existence that randomly and miraculously creates existence for no reason, and via no mechanism.
If you want to avoid all of these crazy ideas, you have nowhere to go but math. Only math can provide a rational, logical explanation of existence. Everything else is moonshine and Mythos.
The Flowing Point
How do mathematical points move in order to satisfy the principle of sufficient reason? The following considerations must all be taken into account:
1) No valid state must be privileged over any other valid state. All valid states are necessarily equal. None has a special status.
2) Each valid state must flow into each other valid state smoothly, uniformly and at the same speed. There can be no sufficient reason for abrupt movements, random speeds, jagged progress, and so on. Note that in science, the precise opposite of the principle of sufficient reason is invoked. Science claims that every possible state, speed and path will happen, given enough time. There is no causation and determinism in such a system. Everything happens according to statistics and probabilities. Modern science has gone wholly over to probabilities. Causation has vanished. Causation is compatible only with uniformity, with one thing happening after another in precise order according to exact, analytic laws. Statistics and probability don’t come into it at all. Everything executes with mathematical perfection. Reality has a 100% success rate. It’s impossible for reality to make an error. If errors were possible, the universe would be overwhelmed by mistakes instantly and would either be wiped out, or degenerate into chaos. The fact that we live in a staggeringly ordered, organised, patterned universe is sure evidence that we do not live in the uncertain, blurry, fuzzy, acausal, indeterminate, indeterministic, statistical, probabilistic universe posited by science. There is nothing in science to prevent endless mistakes from being enacted. In ontological mathematics, a mistake would be something that violated causal law, and such mistakes are impossible. In science, formal causal laws have been abolished, so there is nothing at all to prevent violations of causality (i.e. mistakes). There is no reason at all why one crazy thing after another shouldn’t happen. Science, as ever, cheats. What it does is define lawful (mathematical) outcomes and assign a probability to each one, so that every outcome is at least part of a rational overall pattern, even if not happening in a necessarily logical sequence (although science then makes the convenient claim that the logical sequence is the most probable sequence, thus becoming more or less identical to a causal law, even though that’s exactly what has been denied ). Yet, because it has rejected causation, science has no right to refer to laws at all, or to assign probabilities only to lawful things. But how would it go about defining unlawful things? How can you even refer to senseless, unlawful things? So, we always come back to math, but science denies that mathematics is reality. Science uses mathematics even as it repudiates mathematical causation and law. How irrational is that? It’s forever borrowing mathematical rationalism even as it rejects it in favour of scientific empiricism.
3) Nature makes no leaps. No discontinuous actions take place. There are no logical gaps. Reality is a logical plenum.
4) Nature always operates with maximum economy. It always follows the shortest path.
5) Reality is absolute, not relative. Only absolutism is compatible with the reality principle, which declares that there is a single objective reality for all.
6) Reality is deterministic, not indeterministic. It’s impossible for any event not to be determined by a sufficient reason.
7) Reality is certain, not uncertain; precise, not imprecise. Uncertainty and imprecision are incompatible with objective reality. In fact, uncertainty and imprecision are incompatible with any reality. How can reality be grounded in a blur, a haze, a fuzz? To say that the foundational elements of reality are indeterminate, uncertain and imprecise is to say that reality has no rational, logical basis, and no possible answer. No one can ever explain why “reality” should be uncertain. Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle is actually nothing to do with ontological uncertainty. It’s actually about ontological certainty, but involving two linked domains: an immaterial, monadic frequency domain, outside space and time, and a material domain inside space and time. The “uncertainty” associated with Heisenberg’s principle arises from the emphatic denial by scientific empiricism and materialism of the existence of zero/infinity monadic singularities. As soon as these are taken into account, the uncertainty vanishes. In other words, the supposed uncertainty actually applies to the false ontology supported by science. Change the ontology, and you banish the uncertainty. Science, since it has no foundational rational and logical principles, dismisses all such arguments and looks only for empirical “evidence”, which automatically means it looks only to the material world, and discounts the immaterial world. You cannot go around ignoring a world that you ideologically dislike. Your dislike doesn’t alter the fact that it exists. Science has never once advanced a rational argument to show that mind, soul or immaterialism is false. What it does is ideologically reject them on the basis that they are incompatible with materialism. That’s like Catholicism rejecting everything incompatible with Catholicism. When you have no reason for disregarding things, but only your subjective beliefs, opinions and ideology, then you are members of a Mythos religion. Science is unquestionably a Mythos religion, telling itself a little sensory tale that it finds comforting.
8) Reality must permanently respect the conservation of energy. You cannot “borrow” energy from nowhere, then pay it back to nowhere, as science ludicrously claims. The fundamental things have always existed and can’t not exist. Their existence is their essence. In the case of a finite substance, its essence does not imply or necessitate its existence. In the case of an infinite substance (a zero/infinity monad), its essence necessitates its existence. It can’t not exist. This argument was originally applied to “God” – in the so-called “ontological argument” – but used the curious contention that it is “better” if a perfect Being exists than if it doesn’t exist (or if it exists only in our imagination), or, to put it another way, existence was regarded as a perfection that a perfect Being must possess (if he had all perfections bar existence, he was less perfect than a Being that had all perfections and existence; only the latter could be God, the perfect Being). As ever, “perfection” can only be defined mathematically. The ontological argument can certainly be applied to mathematical monads, but not to a non-mathematical Super Being. The real essence of the ontological argument is that if there is no reason why perfection should not exist then perfection, if it is possible, must exist. If perfection is not forbidden then it is compulsory. If perfection can exist then it does exist. The trouble then becomes one of defining “perfection”. Religious types conceived of it in terms of morality, power, knowingness, being everywhere and seeing everything, i.e. they anthropomorphised it and projected themselves – writ infinitely large – onto it. But you can’t bring human considerations to perfection. It’s strictly about reason and logic, i.e. mathematics. Perfection, mathematically, refers to something with perfect form, a perfect formula, an entity that is eternal, necessary, incapable of being destroyed, degraded or of running down, incapable of error, absolutely precise (associated with no uncertainty), autonomous, consistent, complete. It must always be exactly equal to “nothing” because “nothing” is the only thing that can never be prevented from existing. Nothing must exist! If it exists as static mathematical points then we can refer to that as “non-existence”, but we could just as easily refer to it as existence shorn of all properties: something like Aristotelian prime matter which was conceived as total potentiality – non-being – which required to be actualised by form to become something – being. What actualises the prime matter of static mathematical points with no properties is motion, dictated by the principle of sufficient reason. This motion is none other than rational form, the actualising principle. Motion makes things real. Motion is energy. Everything that exists is energy, and energy is math. Nothing can stop monads from existing. To be clear about their perfection, they are perfect in terms of their objective mathematical form. They are not, however, perfect in terms of their subjective empirical content. The form is eternally perfect. The content – how a monad experiences itself – is that which undergoes the dialectical journey from total potential to total actualisation, from imperfection to perfection, from nothing to God!
9) Reality must be a monism. It cannot be a dualism or pluralism. It can however be a dual-aspect monism, i.e. it can have form and content. It can be both rational and empirical.
10) Reality must reflect the Cartesian principle that effects cannot have more reality than their causes. There is no sufficient reason why they ever could. Uncaused causes, on the other hand, can have more reality than all of their effects. As uncaused causes, they are eternal and necessary. Their effects, however, are temporal and contingent. The uncaused causes belong to the intelligible, rational world of mathematics. The caused effects belong to the sensible, empirical world of science. Underlying reality must always be the same. Manifest reality will change depending on how the uncaused causes interact with each other. The keys of a piano never change, but endless different compositions can be played on the piano, depending on which combinations of keys we choose. We are not compelled to choose any particular tune. No tune has logical necessity, but the piano does. The keys are the uncaused causes. The tunes are the contingent, temporal worlds to which they give rise. Every tune has an exact cause. There is no uncertainty. It’s a little-appreciated fact that the wavefunction of quantum mechanics is entirely deterministic. Left to itself, it will develop entirely deterministically. The incredibly odd feature of the standard Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics is that it requires an indeterministic “collapse” of the wavefunction, prompted by an observation by an observer. Neither an observer or an observation is defined, and no causal mechanism is involved in choosing an outcome. The outcome is “selected” according to probability, although, of course, entirely improbable outcomes are not forbidden, hence any valid outcome, no matter how unlikely, could be actualised. The observer and the observation are entirely extraneous to the theory of quantum mechanics, thus proving that quantum mechanics is an incomplete theory. A proper theory of existence should not have to appeal to something outside itself, which is not defined by itself. Before there were any observers or observations, how did the wavefunction collapse itself? There is no mechanism for doing so. Yet if the wavefunction cannot collapse, it cannot produce the observers who are required to perform the observations that are required to collapse the wavefunction. This interpretation of quantum mechanics is trapped in circularity. It’s plainly absurd, yet this remains the most popular interpretation of quantum mechanics. That’s because science has no interest at all in reason and logic. It just wants to invent little heuristics that seem to work most of the time, provided you don’t subject them to too much intellectual scrutiny. The wavefunction is based on complex numbers, while observable reality is based on real numbers. The wavefunction is unreal and abstract, the world of observations real and concrete. So, we have multiple violations of the Cartesian principle. We have complex numbers versus real numbers, reality versus unreality, potentiality versus actuality, abstractness versus concreteness, non-observers versus observers, mathematics versus science, deterministic wavefunctions versus indeterministic wavefunction collapse, and so on. None of it makes the slightest bit of sense, yet this nonsense is uncritically accepted by the science community and taught throughout the world. People even get awarded Nobel Prizes for coming up with this irrational drivel.
The Circles of Eternity
The principle of sufficient reason mandates that all equivalent states must be given exact parity of treatment. Strange though it may seem, this is what provides the foundation of existence. This requirement entails that the circle is the fundamental basis of reality. In a circle, every point on the circumference has the same status as every other point on the circumference. Moreover, if this is true for one circle, it’s true for any circle.
However, we are now faced with a different question. What exactly do we mean by “circle”? How are we going to define a circle? We must of course apply mathematics, but what manner of mathematics? Are we referring to circles defined by positive real numbers, or a mixture of positive and negative real numbers? What about imaginary numbers and complex numbers?
How are we going to decide what are the circles of eternity? The question now becomes one of mathematical stability, completeness and consistency. Taking stability first...
Ter aanvullling, hier nog even je eerdere opmerking over het bepalen van statuten. Ik zie opnieuw niet in wat de relevantie ervan is. Het taalgebruik ("waarvan je het statuut wilt weten", "cirkel trekken" etc.) lijkt toch echt op iets héél anders betrekking te hebben.
