| Challenge the Philosophy - Dispute 9 (37-) |
In response to Entry 321
"Completeness is momentary and fleeting. Certainly it's better to enjoy a moment than to seek it. I agree that the individual can't be considered a whole unto itself, just as any set of values within a parameter space can't be considered to represent the entire space. In fact the question of ‘who I am’ is somewhat aphophetic in that it relies upon a specific member of the general class ‘who’. So, one implies interconnection through definition. The deeper I contemplate individuality, the more I realize that the elements of my life are all part of larger sets, whose members are shared by many. At any point I am a unique intersection of these sets, but only by definition and comparison. There is no absolute ‘I’ in a unitary sense. There are only the elements that are meaningful to me, here and now. Self knowledge, doesn't fall into the category of truth claims and therefore, the categorization of ‘thing in itself’, through the vehicle of language, constitutes a belief statement.
Here, I am reminded of the Turing test, which, in a broad sense, we take every time we speak. If we ask ourselves to prove consciousness using a set of parameters, there will always be those which could be only defined by another mind, but are applicable when realized.
Ivan Alexander has pointed out the limitation of language and perception when gauging the degree of self-reference. We can only understand one another, and ourselves through love and compassion. Critical analysis can only take us so far, and when it's transitory nature becomes apparent, it reveals itself to be, only technology."
Ken Bell February 22 2002
We agree that the question of "who I am?" implies interconnection through definition because the question relies on a specific member of the general class "who" to understand the question and answer it viz., interconnection exists between the question and the member of the class "who", in order to understand and answer the question. Apparently there is no way around this implication because due to the law of causality, we can only know through questions at some level and point, and thereby through reliance on a specific member of the general class "who". This point is important because due to interconnectedness, it eliminates from our perspective, as you mentioned, an absolute "I" in a unitary sense.
Connected to this point, we agree with you that self-knowledge or "I" does not fall into a category of truth claim, with truth defined as complete knowledge. Though we contend further that no claim falls into a category of truth claim because any question implies interconnectedness by definition, thereby epistemic limitedness as well. From another angle, since the thing-in-itself or complete whole does not fall into a category of truth claim due the interconnectedness between question and member of class "who", and the concept of whole is apparently the only ground to establish truth, as Schopenhauer is aware viz., the concept is crucial to his theory of world as will and representation, it then follows that nothing else can fall into the category of truth claim.
How does our understanding through love and compassion avoid the transitory nature of critical analysis? Is not our understanding through the phenomenal concepts of love and compassion a form of analysis? It appears that due to the lack of knowledge with absolute truth-value, all human thought is transitory viz., nothing concrete, complete, or absolute is ever consciously attained and we know that it is. Though this contention does not rule out that some thoughts are less transitory than other thoughts.