Somebody a Fool about de Golden Rule or “Who really makes the rules?”
The Golden Rule, "Do unto others as you would be done by", is the moral cornerstone of all world religions. Christianity, Buddhism, Judaism ,Islam and many more all have this as their prime moral directive, as do Secular humanists, pagans and probably even vegans.
Its a great rule!
Unless you are a psychopath, its like, the Rule of Rules. Which is why it seems everyone but the psychopaths will follow it at an individual level and every religion will follow it at a foundational level.
So far... so good...
But there is a mystery in this world about the Golden Rule that that I shall try to capture using the indulgence of the poetic muse, a muse that certainly dances with doggerel.
Does it matter to Dharma Practice if Rebirth is true or false?
The question “Is rebirth true or false?” can never be answered with absolutely certainty. In the same way as we can never answer with certainty about the existence of heaven or god from within this universe. The questions are perhaps not meaningless, but they seem close. At most we can have a faith.
Some faiths are backed up by science and experience and reason, others stand blindly on their own while all else must stand on them. But they are all faiths, from the extremely scientific and empirical to the mystical and unsupported.
So this fact that we must have some degree of faith in our reasonings about rebirth means there is no certainty. It is a pointless discussion that may be fun and interesting, but in terms of Dharma Practice it is just wasting time.
This does not mean that there are no serious and interesting and relevant questions about the issue of Rebirth in Buddhism. Perhaps , for Buddhists, the important metaphysical question is not “Is there rebirth?” but, “How would it change my life if I knew rebirth was false?”
Consider these two grounding metaphysical personal beliefs:
- A: This is my only life, it is short and rare.
- B: This is one of my countless lives, when I have left this life I will be reborn in the next life.
I don’t think we have to commit to either to see how a belief in one is incompatible with a belief in other. They are not the same belief, in any sense.
Now you can ask yourself is this Question:
“If I believe A will my life be morally, mentally and spiritually different than if I believe B?”
If you think that A and B would lead to comparable moral, mental and spiritual lives then it shouldn’t matter to you if Rebirth is true or false. If you think it does matter then it seems sensible that your Dharma practice contains an investigation of your reasons for believing in Rebirth or not, and your understanding of why it is important to you.
Incidentally, Buddhism is different from the Abrhamic religions and antitheists who hold that it matters very much if followers believe in A or B.
The Buddha’s First Sermon (Annotated)
The Buddha’s First Sermon (Annotated)
Introduction
This is the first and earliest of the surviving account of the teachings of The Buddha.
All Black text indent text is from on the Buddha.net version of this sutra. All the rest text is my annotation. And is just my ideas, doubt everything, be your own light:)
My Thoughts on Religion and Evolution and a Review of “Intelligent Design by Purple Space Squids”
Most intelligent people believe in Evolution over Intelligent Design. This is because once you start actually thinking for yourself, like intelligent people do, then the facts and reason just don't leave any room for an Intelligent Designer.
You have an intelligent person or an intelligent designer, you can’t have both. Or at least, that is how the argument between Atheists and Theists seemed structured on this particular battle-field in the great Wars of Reason. The cliché you don't need to win the battle to win the war, isnt actually true in the case of Evolution. If the godfearin' folk can show there is intelligent design then the Theory of Evolution becomes Falsified. It’s that simple.
This is the other side of the coin from the creationist "It's only theory!" argument. Yes, Evolution is only a theory. It is there just waiting to be disconfirmed. Nothing can confirm it 100% but already, in 2010 it’s like, 99.999999% confirmed by science, it really is. All the creationists have to do is find one thing that clearly disproves Evolution and that's it, game over, creationists win. The fact that evolution is only a theory is its key strength, not its weakness. If you think about the evolution of The Theory of Evolution then it is beneficial that the theory is attacked and questioned, this way, until it is disproved, it can only get stronger.
Until there is this single piece of counter evidence (bacterial flagellum? I don't think so) the only rational stance it to totally accept the immense body of supporting evidence as being more immensely supporting of the theory, day by day. It was pretty clear cut when Darwin stepped of the Beagle, I expect. So right now, if you want to be rational and a theist you have to incorporate evolution into your world and theistic view. You need to make Evolution compatible with god.
Here is one way religious folk could do that, by holding belifes something like:
"I believe that God made the Universe as a vast simulation. Once started, at the Bing bang, God let it run with randomness and laws. The purpose of God’s universal simulation was, I believe, to produce intelligent, moral beings with free will. The reasons why God wants moral agents beyond comprehension from within this simulation. I believe that Moral Agents are exceptionally rare within the Universe simulation and when, five thousand years ago in the Middle east of this planet a sufficient moral threshold was passed then God took interest. She started interacting, guiding and judging the beings of this simulated planet for her own mysterious ways...etc... etc"
Now I don't believe at all that is the case, but I don't have any real reason to believe it is the not case. It seems all phenomenon in this universe could be inside God’s Cartesian supercomputer. I can think of a number of replies to this supposition that I think show the absurdity of the view, like: Why didn't God interfere over an apple but not over when we got Atom bombs? " Or, “ Why does God care about simulated masturbation?" But these smarter theists will always be able to give the "God works in mysterious ways" response. Note that this is a response that the Intelligent Design people don't have. Their only rational response must substitute “mysterious” with “stupid."
It doesn’t really matter if people continue to believe in intelligent design, nobody should invest their ego in someone else’s beliefs. I used to be more militant on this, when you are passionate that you are right on an issue as big as Evolution it’s hard not to be, as I am sure many can attest. But as soon as you take a stance of opposition, there is conflict.
I have a friend who is a Baptist minister and we have had some big chats on these big religious issues. I am as certain there is no God as he is certain that there is. In our chats we soon realised that there was just no way to resolve that issue without conflict between our two certainties, and that’s not a the conflict between two belief systems, but two people. I now think, though I didn’t used to, that nobody should try to persuade anybody what they should belief, whether in the pub or a school curriculum.
When you take out the personal belief agendas , from both sides, out of the religious debate you are just left with the Big Religious issues. Like the concentration of moral, political and economic power and the use of force in the name of religion. I have digressed, this was meant to be a Video review. Doh!
The Video Review
So... Even if you do believe in Evolution, and especially if you don't, this ten min video is absolutely the biggest butt-kicking Creationism et al has ever got on digital celluloid. It’s like Bruce Lee versus Stephen Hawkin in a fight that needs no equations.
How much of a butt-kicking is it?
Imagine all of St Dwarkin and Hitchen's eloquences on biology and reason being condensed into a ten minute video written by Jon Ronson and directed by Oliver Stone with the single brief: "Display the biggest butt-kicking, by reason, of Intelligent Design, ever".
Even then, you would not have a ten minute video as butt-kicking as this video.
Review over. Roll the projector.
'nuff said.
+:)=:):):)
The Enlightenment of The Buddha (A Story, Not History)
After leaving his Palace, Prince Sidhartha spent six years, trying to understand reality, himself, others, suffering, mind, morality and all. He tried many teachers and methods of ascetic mystical practices, but none could provide the answer to the most important question, “why is there suffering?”
After six years Sidhartha’s mystical quest culminated in a realisation, deep in his longest medication, sitting in Lotus under the Bhodi Tree. He discovered the answer to the mystical quest. It shattered his ground. The answer to the mystical question was that there were no mystical questions. Everything is impermanent and empty, there is nothing beyond this life in time or space or possibility.
“There is no soul!” he realised.
The very notion of rebirth that had underpinned his life of thirty five years and his culture for millennia was a root of the problem: it was a delusion. He saw that so long as he still believed that there was more than this moment, he could never find true peace or joy in any moment. This was the start of Prince Sidhartha’s enlightenment, to escape the constantly negative delusion that there is more to life than this. He had escaped the very idea of rebirth.
“All is empty,” he thought.
“There is nothingness. What should I do?”
From a single point of nothingness the prince started to ascend. He saw how all contingent things from the single point upwards must be impermanent. If there was change, it could be no other way. He saw how from the single point to every point there was connectedness. He saw from the most complex down there was emptiness, there were only points, no things in themselves. He saw how all things, out of a finite space of things, inevitably would tend towards less or nothingness.
“There is no more,” Sidhartha saw.
These three truths he apprehended, and he knew that they must be all true in all possible realms, where all connected things change. And he knew why this was true. These three truths were his foundation. He had shattered the illusionary ground before him and he was deep down at the immutable bedrock.
From this Prince Sidhartha saw how the three foundational truths, that he would call Dharma, underpinned and linked reality together. He knew they connected in all ways and at all levels of perspective and focus, across all domains: the physical, the conceptual, the mental, the moral. All is impermanent. Everything is impermanent. All is connected. Together all must end.
He saw causation was embedded in foundation. All causes have many effects. All effects have many causes. All causes are effects, he knew. This vast, intractable many-to-many network of causes spanned all domains. All paths joined at that single point, the experience of the moment. The now.
“Karma,” he thought. Sidhartha saw how Karma was not magic, as the ancients thought, but the complex moral causal paths that weave and pleach through all experiences. Karma was the blood of life and choice.
“But what is it that chooses?” Sidhartha thought. The Prince asked himself, if there are no objects then how can there be a thing that chooses and wants and likes?
He looked inside his mind and saw how the same truths that entailed that there could be no soul, must also entail that there could be no ego, no self, no object of mind in itself.
“I am nothing,” he knew. Yet something was there, thinking these thoughts, being this now. When he looked he saw what there was. He saw what was, unknowingly, the seed for the illusion of ego.
“There is no thinker, only thoughts!” he realised.
Ego, like soul, he knew was an illusion. All of the me and them, and the now and then, this was all illusion. We hammer our egos like banners into the illusionary ground and then grip them so tightly, desperate not to let go. But Sidharta saw that these are not flagpoles we cling to, they are skewers. The ego skewers us to delusion, it can only use us and pain us and could only ever hold us down.
Ego was the key to understanding suffering. It wasn’t just that impermanence made things negative, it was the craving ego illusion that kept creating more negativity as it twists the skewer it thinks is a banner for its existence. “This is me, that is you.” This is a root of suffering that Sidhartha saw. The illusionary ego won’t let go. The deluded ego wants more. More becomes less. Less becomes nothing. The me still wants more.
There can be no release. This was the cycle of negative feedback that could never be slowed or stopped. The only solution was that found by The Buddha: to destroy the foundation of the cycle, the illusions of ego and permanence and more than this. When there was no ignorance there was no illusion. He saw the cause of suffering and he saw the cause of the absence of peace and truth and joy.
“I must float, not drown,” he thought, as he sought the methods to end the inevitable cycle.
The Budhha found that the ego illusion could be extinguished by understanding the nature of the systems he was contained by and composed of. The Tagatha found that the illusion of “more than this” can be eroded by understanding impermanence, knowing why it is that all things must change. The Enlightened One saw how negativity was causally inevitable and to expect otherwise was delusion. The grasping thirst for more than this, more things, more time, more self, more experiences began to vanish alongside the illusions The Buddha was eroding. In their place was the selfless, soulless, egoless moment of experience that contained no real distinction with the experiences of others. There was no object distinction. Compassion, love, peace and truth could only bring the negative closer to the positive.
The Buddha had found the way from the single impermanent empty point to greater peace, truth and happiness. This un-mysterious path, the moral, mental and conceptual path arose together as one spiritual path.
When The Buddha emerged from his meditation he knew and saw for the first time, The Noble Eightfold Path.
And then he walked the middle path from the beneath the Bhodi tree.
Game Universes Five: The Three Point Universe
[I heartily suggest you read the other four essays in this series before this one:)]
In the one and two point game universes from the last chapters we saw how restricted the number of necessarily true statements we could make were, and moreover, we saw that there were no contingent true statements we could make. All truth possible truth lists were the same.
I think the most profound change in the development of these single point game universes comes when we move from two to three points.
Imagine a universe made of three single points, ABC. We know from Transitivity that it will contain the Truths of the Two and One point universe combined. So we can state:
- True (ABC):
- A exists.
- A is identical with A.
- B exists.
- B is identical with B.
- C exists
- C is identical with C
- A and B and C are Different.
- A and B and C are Connected.
- And so on...
We will find that we cant add more contingent truths to the Universe unless we start stipulating not just what exists but how that which exists is structured. We did this automatically when we made a Glove Universe but with these maximally idealised points we need to be more specific.
Structure
Structure is the arrangement in which the points are connected.
When we just have a two points there is no difference between AB and BA in term's of stating truths. You cannot say, A is to the left of B. One might argue that AB is the opposite structure of BA but I can’t really make sense of that. I'm not sure I need to because as soon as we add that Third point, C, then structure emerges.
ABC is not the same structure as CAB. The points are connected differently. In one, B is connected with A and C and in the other, it is not, there is a point in between. In that one we can say “B is interconnected with C and connected with A”.
But although ABC is not the same structure as CAB, it is the same structure as CBA. That is, ABC=CBA because there is no way the True(ABC) and True(CBA) can contain different truths. In exactly the same way as you cant distinguish between Left and Right in the Glove Universe or AB and BA in the two point universe, you cant distinguish between ABC and CBA.
The Three Point Universe is the first game Universe that has structure. It must necessarily have Structure. For example there are these possible structures for the three point universe:
ABC (or CBA)
CAB (or BAC)
BCA (or ACB)
When you Stipulate three or more points you stipulate Structure. If you stipulate ACB and me ABC then we are stipulating different universes, in the same way as my glove may have had two holes in the button and yours' four.
Structure is one possible arrangement from a set of possible arrangements where the possible arrangements are determined by the parts and the rules. Out of all the possible Three Point Universes, those possibilities are just possible structures and only one of them can be actual, that which is Stipulated.
Structural Properties are properties about the actual arrangement of the Game Universes. Structure is the first Contingent property.
It is the first property that is emergent.
The Only Magic: Emergence
In the Universe Game the property of Emergence is perhaps the most important Property to understand. Once you see how it arises in the Game you can keep your eye open for it in real life, it there, and it is everywhere, from social and moral systems to the realm of the subatomic. It has a substantial metaphysical payload you may need to grapple with, but as a demonstrable phenomenon in theory and reality, its the closest thing we have to an extant creator. Emergence gives us, literally, something for nothing.
If a structure contains a property P and P is not a property of any of its parts then P is an emergent property.
In terms of the Game Universes at least, all we have is nothing but existence, these single points, yet we are making something like meaningful statements about new kinds of things. We get new kinds of meanings out but there are no new kinds of things in. This is emergence; It may well be the only free lunch in Reality.
Betweeness, Connectivity and Interconnectivity
In the three point universe we have a property that is not in any of its parts, this is “Betweenness”
The law of non-contradiction is not contingent, but ABC or CAB are contingent. They are contingent truths about the universe. For example:
- Truth:(CAB)
- A is between C and B
- Truth(ABC)
- A is not between C and B
These are the Same Universes, fundamentally, but differently structured. We know that in a two point universe Connectivity is trivial, in the Three point universe it becomes Contingent and nontrivial. All points in the Three Point universe are either connected directly or interconnected via the other point. For example:
- Truth(CAB)
- A is between C and B
- A is connected with C
- A is connected with B
- C is interconnected with A
These emergent properties arise at three points and yet, if you think forward to ABCDEFG kind of Game universes you will see that there don’t appear to be any new emergent properties. The reason for this is because something is missing, and that something, is dimsensionality.
Dimensionality
So far we have been answering this question by relying on the linear convention of writing them in a line. But I can also imagine and stipulate a three Point Universe arranged so that ABC are not in a line but are all touching.
There is no reason why we can’t imagine this if we can imagine ABC. What is handy about using the Truth List is that we can actually see the difference in connections between the points even if those connections cannot be represented in two or three dimensions. For example, "All points are connected and no points are interconnected" describes a Universe with a different dimensionality to the universe described by "two points are connected and point is interconnected."
The different way the points can be connected, the different possibilities entailed logically make a space of possibilities and this possibility space is what we can term the “Dimensionality”.
I don't know what scientists mean when they talk about ten dimensional space. Or what people who believe in "extra dimensional beings" could possibly know about. But when I look at this most minimal of ABC structures I can see how it is limited not just by the pure logic but by the possibilities that have to exist for it to exists. It is limited by the possible structure. This is Dimensionality.
The Single Point Universe has no Dimensions. Nothing is possible within it. The two point universes might e said to have dimensionality, but this is necessary not contingent upon the structure.
The Three Point universe has Dimensionality. It has structure. It has different possible structures.
Question: How many Dimensions are in the Three Point Universe?
The answer two this question comes from Stipulation. Suppose we stipulate that its a 3PU but that the points must be arranged in a line. In this stipulation we have limited the Dimensionality to 1 Dimension. But if we stipulate the three point universe can be arranged in any logically possible way then we can have two dimensions. As the ABC all connected structure shows. These are not spatial dimensions but structural dimensions
Conclusion to Thought Experiment Four
The logical properties of our Game Universe are set in stone very early on. Even when we move from two to three points we see the logically necessary become replaced by the possible. The stipulated entail the emerged. If we were to make a four point universe or a forty trillion point universe we would find that we wouldn't be able to make that many more non trivial truths about that universe. This may sound surprising but to see what I mean, lets take a quick look at a Four Point universe:
This does have some more contingent truths and emergent properties. For example
- True(ABCD)
- B and C are between A and D.
- A is not contained by C and D
We have these new emergent properties but they are not that remarkable. It becomes more apparent with the five point universe. For example:
- True (ABCDE)
- C is between exactly four points.
We have a new property of "being between exactly four points" and we can imagine that when we have a two billion and one point universe we can have a new property of "being between exactly a billion points." but these are , pun intended, Pointless truths.
Its just more of the same variants on betweens, interconnectivity and dimensionality. Now, as the points increase in number so will the dimensionality, but it two seems like it will be diminishing rapidly. Still something is missing from these Game universes, we will start to see what this is in the next Chapter.
Questions to Ponder
- What new properties could you get from a universe of six points that cannot emerge in a universe of five points?
- Do you see that all of the connections in a There point universe are able to be modelled in this world using Marbles whereas this is not possible with a five point universe?
- Are the Properties of Impermanence and Interconnectivity necessary properties of all parts of all possible Game Universes?
Have Fun!
Doubt in Buddhism
The Kalama Suttra[1] is one of the most important Buddhist texts. It is a short sutra in which the Buddha visits some Kalama’s who ask him which of the many doctrines and claims they should believe in. The Buddha’s answer is clear: he instructs that they, and thus we, should doubt everything:
“Do not go upon what has been acquired by repeated hearing; nor upon tradition; nor upon rumor; nor upon what is in a scripture; nor upon surmise; nor upon an axiom[2]; nor upon specious reasoning; nor upon a bias towards a notion that has been pondered over; nor upon another's seeming ability; nor upon the consideration, 'The monk is our teacher.' “
There are many translations of this, and many interpretations of the specific ten items of doubt, but the general thrust of the Kalama Suttra is that all things are doubtable and should be doubted.
But this proposal of Universal Doubt might seem at odds with another key aspect of Buddha’s teaching, The Five Hindrances. One of these hindrances is Doubt. So it seems we have one part of the Buddha’s teaching is to doubt everything and another part specifies that Doubt is a hindrance to Dharma Practice. Is this an incompatibility?
I think it isn’t, and we can see this by the Buddha’s specification for the removal of Doubt in the Kalama Suttra. The answer is simple. The Buddha instructs the Kalamas that when “you yourselves know ” or, as some translations say, when you “know directly” something that you were doubting, then, and only then, can you be rid of the doubt.
When the Buddha uses “Know” in this context I think he must be using it as meaning Knowing that something is the case because one knows it couldn’t be any other way. To start from the position of Knowing one knows nothing and building on that. It is Knowledge derived by certainty from Universal Doubt, this is the justification for the true beliefs that are known.
The Initial state is Doubt. The problem is that Doubt prevents knowledge; the solution is to know that which cannot be doubted.[3]
The Kalama Suttra is an amazing text, that establishes the critical, skeptcial, rational method, with doubt as its starting point and reflexive certainty as the only viable destination. Doubt is a hindrance and it’s only solution is its removal.
Everything, including the dogma and supernaturalism that has distorted Buddhism over the millennia should be doubted, questioned and tried to be disproved, just as The Buddha instructs with all doctrine and belief. Of course, this means also that the Kalama Suttra should be doubted, and it should! All teachings should be doubted including the one that purports that all teachings should be doubted. But this is not an obtuse paradox, it’s a perfect gem of the Dharmic methodology[4] .
Doubt everything, be your own light.
[1] A version of the Kalam Suttra can be here and four versions of it here.
[2] It always struck me as awkward that The Buddha cites we should doubt axioms, or logical inference, as another translation calls the item. But I was mistaken in this, now I think that it is saying doubt even logic and reason until, as with all claims, they can no longer be doubted.
[3] This state/problem/solution strategy can also be seen with Dukka and the Four Noble Truths. State:Dukka, Problem: Tana/Ignorance, Solution: The Noble Eightfold Path.
[4] Elsewhere The Buddha states that even his words should be doubted. Eg Vimamsaka Sutta. Western philosophers may note how this is similar to the Tratarian “ladder throwing”.
One problem I have with the “Green movement” is…
that it manifests its "goodness" in terms of "buy green" when mostly we shouldn't be "buying" at all.
I am not, per sey, talking about "green" people, but rather the commercial, social and media systems that dominate our lives:)
Game Universes Four:The Two Point Universe
In the last Thought Experiment we created, by stipulation, a Single Point universe and we saw how there was very little we could say about it, but what we could say was clearly connected by Logic. The Final exercise of that last Experiment was to "think deep" about the Single Point universe, to become a Philosopher of the Single Point.
Sure, in most ways it was very boring as games go, but I hope it has given us at least some tools to get into the meat of the matter.
Imagine a Single Point Universe; we know from the last experiment that it will be identical to all other single point universes we can imagine, just like all other perfect circle universes.[1] Let’s now do something that we do lots and often been done for us, and that is to label something. When you label something you are in some sense pointing to that thing, referring to it with the aim to distinguishing it. Let’s call the actual point in the Single Point universe, "Point A" or "A" for short.
A
When we label something like that we are just stipulating a short hand. There is no magic in labelling something and, in terms of Game Universes, there is no special connection between words and the Universe
From the last experiment we know that A’s Truth list will look like this:
- True(A):
- A exists.
- A is identical with itself.
AB
Imagine a Universe that consists just of Two Points, A and B. We know that these are the same kind of points, they are just single points. There is no internal difference between A and B, we have, as it were, more of the same. It absolutely crucial to see in this case and in all future cases that we are just Stipulating more points, not new kinds of things.
When we had the Glove Universe the parts of the glove were arranged in a glovelike way. When we have a Two Glove universe we instantly know that they must in some sense be touching. If they were not, then we would be smuggling space into the Game Universe, and that, is against the rules of the game.
The structure of the gloves determines the possibilities of how they can be arranged.[2]
Thinking about the Two glove universe there are countless ways the two gloves can be structured together[3]. With the Two point universe this isn’t the case, there is only one way they can be structured, and that is AB which is identical to the structuring BA. In the same was as without a reference point and containment space we can’t say if a glove is left or right handed, we cannot say any difference between AB and BA. We can say that AB=BA, which means that the truth lists for AB and BA will be the same.
Possibility Space
With the Glove Universe we could imagine what it would be like, it would be like an ordinary ladies glove, but this could be many things. Some things would need to be the case, like athumb next to a finger, a button at one end, at one side of a slit... and so on. But others are completely open within the Stipulation of the Game Universe. It could have two holes in the button or four, seams inside or out, and so on.
This huge space of things that must be the case and things that could be or could not be the case is called the “Possibility Space” of the game universe. The Two Glove universes and the One Glove Universe both have immense possibility spaces whereas the Two and Single point universes do not.
Unlike the glove universe, the A and AB Universes, leave nothing to the imagination.
The AB Truth List
Let us now look at the Truth list for AB. This is the first composite Truth List in that it is made up of the truth lists of other things, in this case single points.
- True(AB):
- A exists.
- A is identical with A.
- B exists.
- B is identical with B.
What right have we to simply combine the Truth lists? Might it not be that some truths from one list make other truths in another list false when they are combined? No its not possible because then there would either be a contradiction or a stipulating hadn’t been followed[4]
There are more some more Truths we can add, though not many, but first let's discuss the four Truths we have of the Two point Universe.
New Property: Transitivity
That starter list of four True statements seems to comes for free, we don't have to think about it because we know its true of the parts, of The Single Point Universes. If B had the property of being "Awesome!" all on its own in a Single Point Universe then it would have that property of "Aweseomness!" in any other Universes, of however many points it . This logical property we can call “Transitivity”, you might prefer to call it "containment" or "dependence" but I feel they miss out the long and linear paths of transitivity that exist in our reality. Transitivity is true of all lines, whether they are on railways tracks, graphs, upwards through evolution or through the thought processes in your neurons. Transitivity holds, because if it didn't, there would be contradictions.
Transitivity is hard to understand, not because it is complex, but because it is so very simple. It cannot be any other way, it seems necessitated as soon as there is more than one thing by the law of Noncontradiction. You should note that the Two Point Universe doesn't itself contain any Transitivity, the Transitivity is in the relationship between the universe and its more minimal parts.
When we had one point we had no Transitivity. Now we have two, we do. But, the Transitivity isn’t in the Game Universe in the sense the points are, rather its in our simple representation of the logic of the Game Universe.
Transitivity is an Abstract Property of the Game Universe. We saw in Experiment One and Two how there are Structural Properties and logical properties, now we have a property type that is Abstact. Abstract properties are about the universe without being inside the Universe.
New Property: Difference
We know that A=A and B=B. And we know there are two points in the universe, because if there were not, we wouldn't be playing the Two Point Universe Game. So it follows that Point A cannot be the same point as Point B, because if it was, there would only be one point. So now we have a new Truth for the Truth List:
- True(AB):
- A exists.
- A is identical with A.
- B exists.
- B is identical with B.
- A and B are Different.
What is Difference? It is a property that is entailed, at the minimum, by transitivity and non contradiction. We know that A and B together mean that A and B must be different and we can have some blurry understating of why. In the same way as existence and identity are metaphysically hard to grasp, so is difference. Often when something is hard to grasp some clarity can be gained by expressing it in other ways that still preserve the truth. Let's call this list type "Equivalents"
- Equivalents (A and B are Different)
- There are Truths about A that are not True about B
- There is a change of existence between A and B.
- A=A but B does not equal A.
All of the above statements mean, at least relative to the Game Universe, the same thing.
We cannot say anything about the single points other than that they exist and are identical with themselves. But when we have two we know that those two points are not the same existence, they are distinct existences.
The One Point universes had no change. The two point universe has change, it has difference. It might be hard to see because we experience change as a very time, space and causation based phenomenon, but if you think in terms of the True statements of the Two Point Universe you can get at least some grasp on the necessitation of change.
Difference is Change
When we have AB instead of just A, we have something new, even though both Points are Truth list identical with the point from a Single Point Universe. Its crucial that you see this to understand the experiment. In the Single Point universe we had no Change of any kind. It was static in every sense. We couldn't talk about its creation or structural differences, it had none, it was, at best, a bit of existence and identity. So very close to meaningless.
With the Two Point Universe the very act of stipulating two point's rather than one point necessitates the stipulation of Change. As soon as you stipulate an "ordinary glove" you stipulate "five fingers and a thumb" and in the same way, I think, as soon as you stipulate two points you stipulate change.
But, what is change, other than difference?
Imagine a single point again, and now imagine this point can be in one of two sates, A or B. So you imagine a single point that changes state. Don't get distracted by the metaphysics here, we will focus on state changes in a later experiment. So now we have two separate game universes, the Two State Single Point Universe and Two Point One State Universe. I think that if the game Universes can be totally described by the Truth lists then there is no meaningful difference between the two, they have identical truth lists:
- True (Single Point Two State Universe AB):
- A exists.
- A is identical with A.
- B exists.
- B is identical with B.
- A and B are Different.
- True (Two Point Single State Universe AB):
- A exists.
- A is identical with A.
- B exists.
- B is identical with B.
- A and B are Different.
Although one involves change in the "change of thing" sense and one in the "change between things" sense we can see that there seems no other Truths that can differentiate the two.
One objection to the two lists above might be to say "In the Two State Universe, B doesn't exist when it's in state A." I think that this isn't a meaningful objection because it relies on Time. It uses the term "when" which is a temporal term and this is a timeless universe, by Stipulation.
There is another problem with this objection in that it implies it implied an understanding of "Existence" as a simple property. But we have seen above that there appears no way to get any understanding of existence as being a property shared by all things in a universe, stipulated or real. There seems to me to be no statement that can pick up on this though hence I don’t consider it a valid objection.
What I think this part of the Though Experiment suggest is that Change is a logical property of the Game Universe rather than a property of the structure (or systems) of that Game Universe. It is added necessarily by the Stipulations. Therefore, like Transitivity and Consistency, it's existence can't be denied nor fully understood within the Game Universe. We can, if you will, see the necessary evidence of its existence in the Truth Lists.
New Property: Impermanence
If you believe in the necessity of transitivity and identity and therefore change, then it follows that you must believe that State all possible Game Universes will possess these properties at every point. The act of stipulating the Game Universe entails that every point will be in relationships of transitivity and change. Can you think of a possible universe, of any kind, that would lack these necessities? I cannot because I always end up at inconsistency.
Most of us can see how everything changes in the world, and thus all is impermanent, but can we also see that in the two Point Static Universe?
I think we can. We can see from the Truth lists that there is Difference between A and B. There is this change in their existence . It seems that the existence of one must be impermanent because it is prevented by its nonidenity with the existence of the other point. A was all that existed in the Single Point Universe A, but in AB this is not the case.[5]
If we go back to the Circle universe from Experiment two, is it analogous to say "All halves of the universe are impermanent because they are ended buy their opposite halves?" I am not at all sure about that, but it seems to kind of make sense. I think it is analogous to the case of the impermanence of A and B.
This implies that all things are impermanent without the need for things like change in the “tick-Tock” or “Tickle causes giggle" sense. We will see shortly how impermanence is maintained all the way up, but think about how it starts in a very simple sense with just Two Points.
New Property: Connectivity
Imagine how you visualised the Glove Universe in the first experiment. You could imagine and speak of the relationships between the parts. "Two fingers are between two other fingers," for example.
Can we do this in any sense with the Two Point Universe? Can we pick out structural properties? I think we can, and reason is that if AB contains nothing but A and B, ie, no space or time or other parts ,then it follows that there can be nothing between A and B. Thus, AB must be in a structural sense rather than physical sense , touching. The term we can use for this structural touching with nothing in between is “Connectivity” . We now have a new Truth for the AB Truth list, Connectivity.
Connectivity is entailed by creation of more than one, as is difference. It just can’t be any other way, if it was you would have been stipulating a Game Universe of more than two points.
Conclusion to the Third Experiment
We imagined different glove universes but in the case of the Two point, as the One Point, our stipulations will logically be identical. Maybe I have missed True statements about the Two Point universe that you add to your list, that statement I have overlooked will also be true of my universe.
All possible truths Lists about AB (and thus, BA) will necessarily be the same, they will necessarily be at least:
- True (AB):
- A exists.
- A is identical with A.
- B exists.
- B is identical with B.
- A and B are Different.
- A and B are Connected.
We have Properties in the two Point Universe that we don't have in the one point, like Difference or Change and Connectivity but these are necessary, they must be true of all such universes. In the next Thought experiment we will see how with three points we have contingency, and that's when things really start to get possible.
Also in the next thought experiment we will see about Emergence. Difference and Connectivity are emergent properties in the TWO point universe, but in this Game Universe they are Necessarily Emergent. In the next experiment we will look more to the almost magical Abstract Property of Emergence. Ta Da!
(By the way if you would like a PDF of the whole Game Universes essays then please contact me above, no problemmo)
[1] Note that whereas all single point universes and perfect circle universes are identical within their own type this isn’t the case with the single points or the perfect circles themselves. We can imagine a that contains two perfect circles, one being twice the size of the other. In this case there is difference, whereas we cant image two single points with any internal difference.
[2] Its really easy to get confused by the possibility of space in these kinds of two glove universes, and that’s because the structure of the glove contains space as it is. As we saw in Experiment one, you cannot really imagine a single red ladies glove universe but that is fine for the Universe Game.
[3] In these photos of the gloves there is the perspective of the photo, this wouldn’t be in any Game Universe that was a universe of just two gloves.
[4] It seems reasonable to think that “A is the biggest point in the universe” and “B is the biggets point in the universe” are inconsistent truths, this is because they. If they were combined from simpler truth lists then one of them would be falsified at the point of stipulation.
[5] It is easier to imagine an eternal, changeless single point than an eternal changeless two point, because of difference.
