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METAPHYSICS

PROLOGUE TO THE METAPHYSICS

MAIN IDEAS, AIMS AND ARGUMENTS
FROM THE PROLOGUE TO THE JOURNEY IN BEING

The discussion in the prologue draws on material from Journey in Being™ and the Foundation

The Metaphysics

This article stands as an independent essay on metaphysics and incorporates the entire text of the division on Metaphysics from Journey in Being. However, one of the motivations for my study of metaphysics was the Journey in Being. Additionally, each topic benefits from the other. Therefore, the prologue to Metaphysics includes an account of the Journey

The prologues to both articles are essentially identical. The treatment of metaphysics has been broken up and rearranged into Theory [Knowledge and Action | Metaphysics;] Topics [Mind | Cosmology | and Ethics, Being, Knowledge;] and Applications which extracts the metaphysical considerations from the remaining divisions of Journey in Being [Experiments in the Transformation of Being | The Variety of Being | Action and Influence]

Journey in Being and its Goal

Journey in Being refers to a journey and to its story[1]

The Journey begins with an individual life[2] and through confluence[3] it seeks to become the universal journey of ultimate being. It is a Journey of Being for explicit transformation of being is sought in addition to knowledge and learning

The broad purposes are two: realization of ultimate being –of ultimates– and being in the present

…and of relations –interaction, distinctions, identities– between the ultimate and the present

Nature of The Journey

The ideas of Being and Journey are both important. Being refers to the true nature and ultimate possibility of individual beings or entities and of all being and of the universe or cosmos. It also signifies that the being of the individual is important: thought and knowledge are not sufficient to the Journey. Realization of true nature and ultimate possibility do not occur in a moment or as a phase of a life but are, and require[4], the Journey of a life. Journey in Being is not merely a process of discovery of what is given: it is a construction, through experiment, action and reflection, of what is potential or possible

The journey is one into –as far as possible– all being and knowledge, all objects and ideas that do and could exist: ultimate being and knowledge

The nature of being: the actuality of being or being as it is and as we know or experience it; and the possibilities of being

The history of being: being in time – origins, life and death of the forms of being and of the entire universe

Journey in Being is the becoming, being and dissolution of Being within All Being and of All Being i.e. within and of the entire UNIVERSE. The essence of Being is that of the Journey…

In the previous paragraph, ‘being’ is used primarily to refer to a thing but also to a process as in ‘the becoming, being and…’ it is only in a concrete cosmology that these distinctions are ultimate

Dissolution or un-becoming is also becoming. Becoming, being and dissolution are similar to creation, preservation and destruction. A distinction is that while the latter terms are suggestive of the power of an external agent the former terms are used here to emphasize that that the becoming, the being and the dissolution are intrinsic to Being. Since there is nothing ‘outside’ All Being, the intrinsic character of ‘creation’ and so on is essential

Journey in Being, is the Universe in its journeys of being and becoming, its knowing and coming to know. These, together, are the Journey in Being which includes all knowing, understanding, discovery, creation, all narratives and stories

…for, properly understood, Mind [Knowing] is coeval and coextensive with being; Mind is being-in-its-relations or, MIND IS BEING

Journey in Being is, also, the confluence of individual journeys –especially the author’s and those surrounding and interacting with the author’s; and the author’s efforts to engage with others, with this world, with All Being, with the One Universe– in the universal journey that is the being of the entire uni-verse. ‘Journey in Being’ is this journey but refers, also, to this WEBSITE which includes the narratives for the journey

There is an opportunity, through networking, for the narrative, the history of philosophy, to become, not only cumulative though otherwise static, but dynamic in that single narratives may evolve through multiple and ongoing authorship

Form of the Journey In Being

The Form of the Journey is a binding among knowing, acting and being… including the unbound or symbolic forms; JOURNEY IN BEING refers also to my journey, its narrative, and WEBSITE

The form of ‘Journey in Being’ is a binding –interaction– between understanding and becoming. Becoming includes action and essential transformation of being. That understanding has degrees of separation from becoming as in a traditional concept of knowledge is given; however, at root, there is no final separation and the assumption that there is leads to error –including delusions of unbounded rationality– and incomplete fulfillment. The ultimate commitment of this Journey is realization and essential transformation and, except for the dictates of LOGIC, employs but does not wait for the progress of knowledge in any limited concept

Journey in Being is not a new form –of becoming and knowing– but a reversion to an original form that includes and employs but is not restricted to newer forms made possible by the symbolic capabilities and their various enhancements as in e.g. poetry, art, philosophy, analysis and science

An Individual Journey

Journey in Being, it was noted, is also my journey, the story of my coming into the ideas and paths that make up The Journey. My life is a part of the journey – but this document is not a vehicle to tell an intimate story of my life. What is significant is how I came to undertake and continue the journey, especially to the extent that the origins are essential in understanding and founding the journey

These purposes are consistent with the nature of the Journey

My motivation in undertaking the journey and its narrative include, of course, expression, realization and enjoyment. Contribution and sharing are also motives. There is also a mixture of confidence and doubt, of intuition and reason. Many of the central propositions of the present essay have origin in intuition and hope – suggested by my own reflections and the thoughts of others. Without confidence in the intuition, I would not sustain the propositions as beliefs. Without doubt, the beliefs would not have made the transition to the status of propositional thought. Without some confidence in the originality of the ideas, I would not write; without doubt, I could not create

What is Being

…and what is the purpose of the focus on being?

Here, being is used in two apparently distinct senses. In the first, being is that which exists. This leads to a problem ‘How is it known that any alleged being actually exists?’ In turn, analysis of ‘existence’ is required which leads to classic difficulties and therefore to the postulation of categories of being. Thus we may say, a rock exists as matter, an individual mind as mind, a relationship as relationship, a number as number and so on but what does it mean that something has unqualified existence? ‘Existence,’ ‘matter,’ ‘mind,’ ‘relationship,’ ‘number’ and other mathematical objects and related concepts are analyzed in the essay and the foundation where common ground is established for the varieties or categories of being – eliminating the need for the categories. There, the characters of mind, matter, laws, and concepts such as number… are clarified and their root identities are shown in the common ground of e.g. power i.e. the capacity for effect. In consequence, it is possible to assert, simply, that having being is existing. It is now possible to ask, with hope of an ontologically sound answer, ‘What is the character of some compound entity?’ Having placed mind, matter, relationship, idea on a common plane it is possible to say, simply, that its character is its set of constituents [or elements – where specification of what are allowed as elements is intentionally left open.] This leads into the second sense of being: the being of an entity is what it truly is; the admission of this sense of ‘being’ is equivalent to the questions ‘What is the nature of being?’ ‘What is the science or study of being as being?’ i.e. not as any particular kind of being…

As used here, the being of an individual –of an entity– is what it truly is and that includes its possibilities and potentials or likely possibilities

It includes what is tangible or sensible and what is real – and what is potentially real. The sensible includes the body. The real includes the sensible, and the possible; and mind, and all concepts that correspond to what is real: examples that could be considered are spirit, soul and substance. However, while consideration of a wide range of possible forms and kinds of being from the history of thought is useful in developing an understanding of the fullness of being – of its nature and possibilities, it is unnecessary to attempt a review of all forms and kinds

The nature of being, the real, has been approached in many ways: conceptually, through knowledge and understanding as in the sciences and the tradition of philosophy; through exploration whose counterpart in science is experiment; through exploration and construction in of the possibilities of the form of being, for example the human body and human experience and in art and technology; through exploration in the world; and, not the least, by interactions among these modes. Interaction is necessary for the understanding might start with a concept of being, then an exploration in science or in the world or in ideas… and then the original concept may be modified and so on in the approach to improved understanding; and while an individual or a culture builds on what has come before, the question of being must be lived in order to have fullness of meaning

While there can be no entity that has no effect i.e. since all being may enter in some way or manner into awareness there is also a sense in which all being comes before any particular awareness or study of being. Fullness of being is lived and not merely thought. This is fundamental

That the being of an entity is ‘what it truly is’ begins as an implicit characterization. The value of an implicit characterization is its generality and openness; however, an explicit characterization –taken up later in the prologue– is also valuable even if we do not know that it will apply to all being. [It is part of the power of the metaphysics of being developed in the essay and the foundation that what would often be thought of as an implicit characterization is also, as noted above, an explicit characterization]

Being and knowledge of being have both definite [actual] and indefinite [possible] or unrealized aspects. It would be absurd to claim that human being has realized or knows all possible kinds or aspects of being or to claim that there is no knowledge or realization at all

The meaning of the being of an individual or entity –what it truly is– defines the first purpose of the focus on being. A related, purpose to the focus on being is that the concept of being includes the indefinite: what is unknown and unrealized but what is possible; the question of the nature of being is an invitation to adventure – an ultimate adventure… the ultimate adventure

Because of the indefiniteness, coming into knowledge and realization is and must be a Journey into Being

A Journey into Being Itself

… a journey in understanding of the possibilities or potentials of being; of knowledge and traditions of knowledge – for all being and understanding

… and in transformations in being – experiments in realization of possibilities; of traditions of experiment with being

Knowledge or understanding and experiment are the main paths of the journey. There are two further areas of study and experiment: the variety of being, intelligent and conscious artifacts or machines; and action and influence including social action, that round out the Journey. These four phases or areas of activity are described in and constitute four main sections of the essay. Each phase is a part of the journey; additionally the phases complement one another through the following functions. The approach through knowledge shows what is possible and moral and, as far as is possible, seeks to provide foundation for all phases and areas of the journey. The experiments constitute the core of the journey; additionally knowledge and experiment are mutually interactive in discovery and in providing confirmation and justification. The studies in the variety of being round out both knowledge and experiment through investigation of different kinds of being – there is a specific emphasis on the being of machines as agents and as additional “data” points in the study of being. The phase of social action and influence may be seen as sharing of the journey with others and, through, mutual action a further dimension to understanding and experiment in being