Essence (Part II)

[Liberal]

This is a resumption of a discussion that was ongoing at the time of my suspension. There were too many private e-mail correspondences that followed over the thirty days to recap here, but I think that one from Otherwise is fairly representative of the rest as a whole. So, I’ll launch this OP by responding to it here.

Briefly, my operating premises and definitions are these:

(1) Essence precedes existence.

(2) The essence of goodness is edification.

(3) Goodness is an aesthetic, rather than an ethic (though it may inform ethics).

(4) Goodness is the aesthetic most valued by God.

(5) The essence of goodness compels God’s existence (as the agent Who facilitates goodness).

=======================================================

@Otherwise

What if someone doesn’t like what he values (an oxymoron, but bear with me). For most people (myself included) there are values in the sense we’ve been describing (strong internal pull/drive with corresponding external behaviors aimed at fulfilling those drives), but some of those drives and behaviors I’d just as soon be rid of. Assuming values can change, what precipitates change of a deeply held value? How do we “guide” our essence, especially if we’ve been holding the screwdriver backwards since the day we picked it up?

I think that it is our essence that guides us, rather than the other way around. It is, after all, what we essentially are. Does that mean we can’t change? No, because essence and existence are not the same. Consider, for example, the man who is born with the identity of a woman. Though she exists as a man, she is not a man essentially. Her maleness is a physical abberation. She has held the screwdriver backwards from the time she was born. Whether she can change her existence is not an aesthetic issue, but an epistemic one. If she has the means to do it, then what she values will compel her decisions.

Also, I’ve noticed that you use the word “longing” (or emotionally similar phrases) often in conjunction with “value”. Perhaps I’m making this up, but I’m starting to think that it must be an especially apropos or personally meaningful word. Could you expound on how the sense of longing relates to value?

I don’t see it as emotionally charged, but as spiritually charged. It isn’t something that is consciously decided. We are drawn to what we value despite our mental or emotional states. It need not even make us happy, in the sense that some people aren’t happy unless they are miserable. Longing relates to value in the same way that lust relates to sexual attraction. The longing is a result of valuing.

In my last post, I mentioned how mystics claim that ultimate spiritual experience involves a dropping of subjectivity from “subjective awareness”. Some traditions hold that this happens through diligent meditative or contemplative practices. Some hold that it happens entirely through grace. Some hold views between the two (As it was once explained to me: “Enlightenment is an accident. Meditation makes one accident-prone.”)

My question is: do you feel that some sort of mental (discipline/training/practice, whatever) is helpful or necessary in becoming (or perhaps, just realizing) who we essentially are?

No, I don’t. We are essentially spiritual beings. It is impossible to realize our essence so long as we are burdened by our physical existence. Nevertheless, it is the exercise of existing physically by which we express our morality. It is a part of the process of realization. Aesthetics is an infinite manifold of value and objects of value. But morality is a bifurcation: there is perfection and all else. Moral perfection is an edifice that sets on the foundation of aesthetics.

Also, WRT the similarities between “essence” and “subjective awareness”, Rudolf Carnap once wrote:

“Einstein said the problem of the Now worried him seriously. He explained that the experience of the Now means something special for man, something essentially different from the past and the future, but that this important difference does not and cannot occur within physics. That this experience cannot be grasped by science seemed to him a matter of painful but inevitable resignation. So he concluded that ‘there is something essential about the Now which is just outside the realm of science’.

(I have never been able to verify Carnaps’s claim, nor have I found similar sentiments in writings by or about Einstein, but it seems reasonably plausible that he would hold this attitude.)

I would think that essence is entirely outside the realm of science, since science tests empirical claims, and essence is not empirically detectable. I’ve given the example before of a man who is feeding a hungry beggar. Our senses tell us that the man is doing a good deed, but unknown to us, he is enacting his plan to lure the beggar into his car where he will beat and rape him. Even were you to observe the later act, rather than the earlier one, you still would not know the essence of the man. His brain may be chemically imbalanced, and he is doing acts that are essentially against his will. He may even perceive his actions differently than you do. He sees his rape and murder as a ritualistic purging of the beggars demons, and a release of the beggar into the hands of God. History is replete with tyrannical maniacs who genuinely believed they were doing the will of someone else, typically some higher power.

My grasp of physics is shaky, but don’t most physicists these days hold to a block theory of time, where past, present and future just are? If so, does the fact that, subjectively, we do not experience the past and future simultaneously, and seem instead to be perpetually nestled between the two, serve to support your ideas about our “essence” being atemporal?

I really don’t know. Sentient or someone else can tell us more about what scientists are thinking today. But it is certainly the case that simultanaeity with respect to essence is moot. You were what you essentially are before the universe even began. Or as Jesus put it: “Before Abraham was, I am.”

Ok, changing gears; I’m having a difficult time reconciling your description of God with your claim to have a personal relationship with him. Is the personal relationship the result of God having the God-equivalent of a human personality, or does it take that form because you have a human personality and any relationship will necessarily be cast in those terms?

That bears directly on being created in His image. I am His son. Sonship derived from sexual reproduction is a trivial thing. But sonship derived from God’s will — His facilitation of goodness — is eternal and significant. My relationship with Him is not one of two people embraced, but of two people merged.

[other-wise]

@Lib

I don’t see it as emotionally charged, but as spiritually charged. It isn’t something that is consciously decided. We are drawn to what we value despite our mental or emotional states. It need not even make us happy, in the sense that some people aren’t happy unless they are miserable. Longing relates to value in the same way that lust relates to sexual attraction. The longing is a result of valuing.

Is a person’s inherent essence reflected in what they long for? If, when God created (ablated?) me, my essence was the same as His (facilitating goodness) but now I spend my free time raping, pillaging, and looting, thus fulfilling my longing to do so and happy as a clam about it, what the heck happened to my essence?

Does free moral choice include, in some sense, choosing our essence, or is it more a matter of choosing (or not) to fulfill and manifest that essence?

If it’s the latter, how do “our mental or emotional states” impact that choice?

@Lib

He may even perceive his actions differently than you do. He sees his rape and murder as a ritualistic purging of the beggars demons, and a release of the beggar into the hands of God. History is replete with tyrannical maniacs who genuinely believed they were doing the will of someone else, typically some higher power.

Just checking: there’s no way to determine whether this person was or was not choosing to act in a way that’s morally edifying, correct?

@Lib

My relationship with Him is not one of two people embraced, but of two people merged.

I’m still very unclear on this. When you pray, is it more akin to interaction or introspection?

[II_Gyan_II]

@Liberal

Goodness is an aesthetic

May one man’s goodness be another man’s evil?

How does one know whether one is being good? Is feeling so, enough?

@Liberal

Consider, for example, the man who is born with the identity of a woman.

What does this even mean?

[Liberal]

@other-wise

Is a person’s inherent essence reflected in what they long for?

Yes, I believe it is. The longing is the spiritual expression of attraction. We are attracted to what we find attractive.

If, when God created (ablated?) me, my essence was the same as His (facilitating goodness) but now I spend my free time raping, pillaging, and looting, thus fulfilling my longing to do so and happy as a clam about it, what the heck happened to my essence?

I reject the antecedent, actually. I don’t think God created you in the sense of cloning Himself. I think He created you in the sense of making a potential vessel in whom He could dwell. A sort of lover. It is a good thing that He made you, but that does not mean that you value goodness or what He did. Many people curse their own existence — and His, for that matter.

Does free moral choice include, in some sense, choosing our essence, or is it more a matter of choosing (or not) to fulfill and manifest that essence?

Free will, I believe, is a matter of morality as you say. I take it to mean free moral will. You and you alone make your moral decisions, and they are driven by what you value most. Thus, the aesthetic gives rise to the ethic. If I understand what you’re getting at, it’s not a matter that our essence drives us to value this or that, but that our essence enables us to value this or that. If we value goodness, then we will do good things. If we do not value goodness, then we are not capable of doing good things. This is why Jesus taught that Satan cannot help but lie, because he is the father of lies and has lied from the beginning. It might help for understanding to remember that what we are talking about is not valuing things. Or even principles. But beauty. What is beautiful to you? Whatever that is, that is what you will pursue.

If it’s the latter, how do “our mental or emotional states” impact that choice?

None at all. It is not uncommon even for those who love God with all their heart to doubt Him or be angry with Him from time to time. But these are mental doubts. Brain chemicals. Nothing of significance.

Just checking: there’s no way to determine whether this person was or was not choosing to act in a way that’s morally edifying, correct?

That’s correct. And that’s why we are to refrain from making moral judgments. His consciousness is closed to us. He is his own being. Our viewpoint is equally as subjective as his.

I’m still very unclear on this. When you pray, is it more akin to interaction or introspection?

When I pray, it is akin to making a petition. When I listen for the voice of God, it is akin to quiet introspection.

[Liberal]

@II Gyan II

May one man’s goodness be another man’s evil?

Yes, definitely. One man’s hell is another man’s heaven, and all that.

How does one know whether one is being good? Is feeling so, enough?

None of us is being good. Only God is being good. Jesus taught this: no one is good but the Father, not even the Son.

What does this even mean?

It means that a man might be born such that he does not identify with his own body, his own maleness. He might long to have the body of a woman because everything inside him tells him that he is a woman essentially.

[II_Gyan_II]

@Liberal

None of us is being good.

Let me rephrase: how does one know that one is doing that which edifies?

It means that a man might be born such that he does not identify with his own body, his own maleness.

For that one would have to have a definitive conception of what it means to be a man (in order to know that something is amiss). Why not just accept oneself as a male with different characteristics?

[other-wise]

@Liberal

I don’t think God created you in the sense of cloning Himself. I think He created you in the sense of making a potential vessel in whom He could dwell.

AND

**<snip>**You and you alone make your moral decisions, and they are driven by what you value most. Thus, the aesthetic gives rise to the ethic. If I understand what you’re getting at, it’s not a matter that our essence drives us to value this or that, but that our essence enables us to value this or that. **<snip>**It might help for understanding to remember that what we are talking about is not valuing things. Or even principles. But beauty. What is beautiful to you? Whatever that is, that is what you will pursue.

Assuming that what we find beautiful is unaffected by our mental or emotional states, what’s the basis for preferring one aesthetic over another? What determines what we find beautiful? (i.e., on what basis do we choose?)

@Liberal

When I pray, it is akin to making a petition.

Forgive this next analogy, Lib, but it’s late and I’m a bit sleepy. When I read the above, I get a picture of a lamp feeling about with its cord for the wall socket. Is that at all close?

[Liberal]

@other-wise

AND Assuming that what we find beautiful is unaffected by our mental or emotional states, what’s the basis for preferring one aesthetic over another? What determines what we find beautiful? (i.e., on what basis do we choose?)

It fulfills you. It is home. It is the only thing with which you are familiar. All other things are strange and foreign to you.

Forgive this next analogy, Lib, but it’s late and I’m a bit sleepy. When I read the above, I get a picture of a lamp feeling about with its cord for the wall socket. Is that at all close?

Interesting analogy. It’s awfully close to my experience when I first encountered Him, except that my intention had been to show that there was no socket.

[Liberal]

@II Gyan II

Let me rephrase: how does one know that one is doing that which edifies?

I’m not sure one does. You may be thinking that there is some formula or rules set that, when followed, ensures the facilitation of goodness thereby making one one with God. But that would be an ethic. Instead, you value what you value. If that matches what God values, then you are one with God. The only possible reason that that should concern you is if God is what you value, and you want to be sure that She is the object of your longing. Otherwise, you are given what you long for, so what’s the problem?

For that one would have to have a definitive conception of what it means to be a man (in order to know that something is amiss). Why not just accept oneself as a male with different characteristics?

I can’t say. I don’t wish I were a woman. I’ve just heard tell that transgendered people felt that way, and so I used it as an example. I don’t know what experiences you have had with which you can empathize. Perhaps you could consider the example of being locked out of your home while it is the place where you truly wished you were.

[other-wise]

@Liberal

It fulfills you. It is home. It is the only thing with which you are familiar. All other things are strange and foreign to you.

AND

(answering ll Gyan )<snip> Instead, you value what you value. If that matches what God values, then you are one with God.

Maybe I’m being dense, but I still don’t understand how we acquire the value (whatever that value turns out to be). Since it’s not influenced by mental or emotional states, it sounds like it’s just there, the essence-equivalent of being hardwired in from the start. What am I missing here?

[Liberal]

@other-wise

Since it’s not influenced by mental or emotional states, it sounds like it’s just there, the essence-equivalent of being hardwired in from the start.

Yes, certainly. If it weren’t hardwired, it wouldn’t be essence. Remember that our understanding of the concept comes from Aristotle’s “to ti ên einai” (the what it is to be), for which the Romans invented the word “essentia”. A man cannot be what he isn’t. Contradictions cannot exist.

[other-wise]

@Liberal

Yes, certainly. If it weren’t hardwired, it wouldn’t be essence. Remember that our understanding of the concept comes from Aristotle’s “to ti ên einai” (the what it is to be), for which the Romans invented the word “essentia”. A man cannot be what he isn’t. Contradictions cannot exist.

Still feeling dense. Here’s what doesn’t add up: My essence is an “empty vessel”, perfectly suited as a dwelling place for God, but because I have free moral will, I can let anything that I please dwell there. However, what dwells there is hardwired.

What happened to my free moral choice? How can a “hardwired” vessel be empty?

[SentientMeat]

Suffice it to say, I reject the first premise since I consider “essence” to be a neuropsychological output similar to a kind of average of memories: you see this tree, that tree, thousands of trees throughout childhood, and your brain ends up with a statistical average of the trees it has seen, this being the “essence” of trees. Thus, for those billions of years when no DNA molecules had arranged themselves into a photosynthesising system of leaves, stem and roots, there was no “tree essence”, and no shampoo commercials based thereon.

So I’ll lurk around this nevertheless interesting thread in case points of fundamental science arise, but I’d hate for them to intrude too conspicuously - I’ll open new threads upon request.

@Lib

Sentient or someone else can tell us more about what scientists are thinking today [about time]. But it is certainly the case that simultanaeity with respect to essence is moot. You were what you essentially are before the universe even began.

“Before the universe began” is a contradiction in terms. The universe is space and time. There is no such thing as “next to” all of space or “before” all of time. There may be “other universes” (a phrase I detest, much preferring “other regions of the universe, our 3-D temporal region being just one”), but no time of no universe. (I’m in the midst of The Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene, and it is truly excellent, for anyone seeking a good book on the subject).

But other-wise is pretty accurate. All the events in the universe have already happened, in the same way that all the places in the world are shown on a map. We’re just at a location where they haven’t happened yet for us. The “flow” of time from the future through our “now” and into our memories is considered to be a neuropsychological effect based on the evolutionary necessity of having a processor which can predict “where the prey will jump” etc. Julia Barbour’s The End of Time explores this quite well.

[SentientMeat]

Erratum: Julian Barbour’s The End of Time explores this quite well.

I didn’t mean to cast aspersions on his masculine essence.

[Liberal]

@other-wise

Still feeling dense. Here’s what doesn’t add up: My essence is an “empty vessel”, perfectly suited as a dwelling place for God, but because I have free moral will, I can let anything that I please dwell there. However, what dwells there is hardwired.

What happened to my free moral choice? How can a “hardwired” vessel be empty?

Well, let’s clear these up one at a time.

First, I didn’t say that your essence is a vessel, empty or otherwise. I said that God created you as a potential vessel in which He could dwell. I made that point only because you asked about being created in the image of God and thereby being a facilitator of goodness. That isn’t what it means to be created in His image. As I said then, it doesn’t mean that you’re a clone of God. You are *like * Him in that you are spirit. Jesus taught that God is spirit, and must be worshiped (if He is to be worshipped) in spirit and in truth. As a vessel, you are a spirit in whom God, Who also is spirit, may dwell.

Second, there is nothing about the fact that you are spirit that compels you to allow God to dwell with you. The slipper may fit Cinderella, but if the prince stays home, then the ending to the story changes. And there is nothing that forces Cinderella to try it on if he brings the slipper to her. The ending we have came about because she valued him and he valued her. It was his longing to find the love of his life whom he thought he had lost, and her longing to find the love of her life whom she thought had left her that brought them together with slipper in hand and toe at the ready. In other words, the aesthetics compelled their encounter.

But third, the moral decisions that we make have nothing to do with the aesthetic that we pursue. Suppose instead of going to her, falling to his knees, and offering her the slipper, that the prince decided to send goons to kidnap her, hold her down by her hair, and shove the slipper on her foot. The slipper still fits her, but all aesthetics have been destroyed. She surely will no longer find him to be beautiful once she has learned that he is in actuality Prince Uday Hussein. And his goal to find the love of his life is destroyed because she will not love him for these acts.

It seems that, for whatever reason, you are not separating the aesthic from the ethic even though they are not the same. You absolutely cannot value anything other than what you are wired to value, but your ethical choices are your own. This is what makes God morally perfect. He does not facilitate goodness because He has no choice; He facilitates goodness because He values it above all else and freely wishes to share it with others. Goodness compels His existence, but not His choices. But because of the nature of goodness, there must always be a God. Were God to decide to abdicate, New God would arise. (And in fact, would always have been God after all.)

[Liberal]

@SentientMeat

So I’ll lurk around this nevertheless interesting thread in case points of fundamental science arise, but I’d hate for them to intrude too conspicuously - I’ll open new threads upon request.

That’s why you are a gentleman among gentlemen and a scholar among scholars. You do not come in here to stir up shit and bellow about how ridiculous my philosophy is, even though you disagree with it on practically every fundamental level. I still have a lot to learn from you.

“Before the universe began” is a contradiction in terms.

You’re absolutely right, of course. It is an unfortunate phrase, much like the “other universes” phrase that you loathe but use anyway for purposes of efficacy. What I should have said, instead of “before the universe began” is “irrespective of time”, but not just because of physical definitions of time. The metaphysical is not contingent on time at all, and therefore whatever is “before” is indistinguishable from whatever is “after”. Whereas we may now speak of this before that in the universe, there is still no this before that in God’s realm.

Thanks for being kind enough to monitor the discussion in the event that you find something interesting. Do not feel constrained to speak to scientific matters only. Your opinions and questions are always valued, and may well help to illuminate the topic at hand.

[other-wise]

Lib, it’ll be easier for me to address these out of sequence, if you don’t mind:

@Liberal

Second, there is nothing about the fact that you are spirit that compels you to allow God to dwell with you.

Understood.

First, I didn’t say that your essence is a vessel, empty or otherwise. I said that God created you as a potential vessel in which He could dwell.<snip> You are like Him in that you are spirit.

I feel that I don’t have a solid conception of your conception of “Spirit” (what it is and/or entails), but I think my conception should be good enough for the purposes of this discussion (I would like to further clarify my understanding at some point).

But third, the moral decisions that we make have nothing to do with the aesthetic that we pursue. <snip> It seems that, for whatever reason, you are not separating the aesthetic from the ethic even though they are not the same.

Well,… yeah.
My confusion stems from your previous statement (emphasis mine):

@Liberal

You and you alone make your moral decisions, and they are driven by what you value most. Thus, the aesthetic gives rise to the ethic.

I’m having a very difficult time parsing all three statements together coherently. I was under the impression that one values what one values, and morality boils down to our actions either being in alignment with our values or not. But now I’m really confused…

(Also, I’m still trying to understand how our individual hardwired values get hardwired. Assuming God doesn’t hardwire them for us, and they’re not influenced by emotional or mental states, how do they get there? Statements like: “It fulfills you. It is home” tell me how I recognize it, or what it feels like, but not how I got that value in the first place.)

Sentient:

@Liberal

Thanks for being kind enough to monitor the discussion in the event that you find something interesting. Do not feel constrained to speak to scientific matters only. Your opinions and questions are always valued, and may well help to illuminate the topic at hand.

Ditto.

[Liberal]

@other-wise

I’m having a very difficult time parsing all three statements together coherently. I was under the impression that one values what one values, and morality boils down to our actions either being in alignment with our values or not. But now I’m really confused…

Your statements are correct, so your confusion should be easy to clear up, and apparently hinges on this, “…the aesthetic gives rise to the ethic,” and this, “…the moral decisions that we make have nothing to do with the aesthetic that we pursue”.

When I say that the aesthetic gives rise to the ethic, I don’t mean that the aesthetic determines what the ethic will be; rather, I mean that the aesthetic is the foundation upon which the ethic is built. Upon the same foundation, many styles of homes may be constructed. Likewise, you and I might both value, say, the Mona Lisa, but I seek to steal it for myself while you seek to share it with others. What we value is driving what we do but now how we do it. Ethics is a matter of how things are done. If a philosophy is ethics based, then what matters are principles of behavior. (Libertarianism is one example: it is based on the ethic of noncoercion.) Unfortunately, precious few philosphies have been developed on the basis of aesthetics (with the conspicuous exception of the rather morbid philosophies of Schopenhauer.) It is my contention that Jesus taught an aesthetics based philosophy, and frankly was rather dismissive of ethical codes — not even bothering to state an original one. The Golden Rule is old as dirt. He drifted all the way from that to the astounding ethical declaration that are to “Be perfect, even as your Father in Heaven is perfect.” So, He leaves us with the blatant message that ethics is unimportant because you can’t follow the rules anyway. It is therefore a matter of what we value, or as Jesus put it: “Where your treasure is, there your heart is also.”

(Also, I’m still trying to understand how our individual hardwired values get hardwired. Assuming God doesn’t hardwire them for us, and they’re not influenced by emotional or mental states, how do they get there? Statements like: “It fulfills you. It is home” tell me how I recognize it, or what it feels like, but not how I got that value in the first place.)

God does hardwire them. Your essence — and not your existence — is what is significant about your creation. Not everyone is wired to seek out God, as should be plain by the fact that lots of people don’t, and couldn’t care less. As Jesus taught: “I chose you, you did not choose me.” Are they who do not value God disadvantaged? Objectively, no, because God gives them the desires of their heart, just as He gives Himself to those who seek Him. Those who seek are the ones He chose, and Jesus taught: “Seek, and you will find.”

[other-wise]

@Liberal

When I say that the aesthetic gives rise to the ethic, I don’t mean that the aesthetic determines what the ethic will be; rather, I mean that the aesthetic is the foundation upon which the ethic is built. Upon the same foundation, many styles of homes may be constructed. Likewise, you and I might both value, say, the Mona Lisa, but I seek to steal it for myself while you seek to share it with others. What we value is driving what we do but now how we do it. Ethics is a matter of how things are done. <snip> It is my contention that Jesus taught an aesthetics based philosophy, and frankly was rather dismissive of ethical codes — not even bothering to state an original one. The Golden Rule is old as dirt. He drifted all the way from that to the astounding ethical declaration that are to “Be perfect, even as your Father in Heaven is perfect.” So, He leaves us with the blatant message that ethics is unimportant because you can’t follow the rules anyway. It is therefore a matter of what we value, or as Jesus put it: “Where your treasure is, there your heart is also.”

This last post corralled several loose pieces floating around in my brain and snapped them together with an audible click! I have a much clearer picture of what you’re saying now. A question: Do you interpret Jesus’ philosophy as, in part, a call for people to make the pursuit of what they value most absolutely primary? To go full-bore and embrace/seek that value with everything they’ve got and, instead of worrying so much about their behavior (what to do, how to do it), let their behavior fall out naturally from the pursuit?

@Liberal

God does hardwire them. Your essence — and not your existence — is what is significant about your creation. Not everyone is wired to seek out God, as should be plain by the fact that lots of people don’t, and couldn’t care less. As Jesus taught: “I chose you, you did not choose me.” Are they who do not value God disadvantaged? Objectively, no, because God gives them the desires of their heart, just as He gives Himself to those who seek Him. Those who seek are the ones He chose, and Jesus taught: “Seek, and you will find.”

This one’s harder for me to grasp. My knee-jerk reaction is to think: “O.K., let’s see… God made me to value despair above all else, and there’s nothing I can do about it. So, when I die, I’ll despair for all eternity. Gee, thanks a lot”. But then, if I truly value despair above all else, I end up getting utterly, what I long for absolutely. So, as you say, what’s the problem? I need to mull on this for awhile…

[George_Kaplin]

Sorry to intrude, but could anyone point me in the direction of a couple of basic (like Ladybird basic) primers on essentialism and existentialism? This all seems fascinating and I’d really like to participate in any future threads on the topic but it’s all going over my head at the moment. Cheers.