I don’t know whether I’ve made a bit of a breakthrough in my own understanding of the issue, or it’s just that I am now again re-grasping the notion, but it’s just seeming much clearer to me this morning than it has been recently.the premise that:
‘a thing (an object in the world) is meaningless and is only invigorated with meaning by my viewing of it’
is entirely off track of how a thing has meaning, and about what meaning is entirely. there is no back and forth on meaninglessness. things that are without meaning are things that are unknowable, and really have no worth (or possibility) of explanation.
are the words on paper dead? no. entirely not. the point is that nothing is dead, if it enters in to your consciousness it is meaningful, it is something.
the recognition of an object suggests already that it has some kind of semantic weight. the spectrum of meaning is the spectrum of reality.
it depends on a kind of horizon of consciousness, not in ‘what you can see’ but in ‘what you can know’.
how does it come about that an arrow points?
with all this in mind, let us think then about perspective.
the issue at hand might only be problematic in our pre-conceptions of it. for example:
Mathematically, in space and time parallel lines will never meet. However, we assuming here in this mathematical proof that we can have such a thing as a ‘god’s eye view’ or an objective viewpoint. Although it is the case that on paper we can draw itand on the ground we can follow it, but doesn’t it say something that we can truly never see a straight line? Even from space, there is always a concave.
Perhaps the problems what we encounter in quantum physics and in theories of time and space (as they also apply to issues of morality, or social contract) is that we are looking at the world entirely in the wrong way, and assuming that we can look at it through a clean lense.
I don’t get it…was there ever any doubt that understanding/meaning could occur with out viewing/experiencing?
if you say that you understand quantum physics, then they don’t understand quantum physics :)
can you go into more detail on the “never truly seeing a straight line?” that confuses me a bit :)
(btw, thanks for checking out the video presentation… it’s a good supplement…! All of Episode 13 is an interview, which I’ll be doing in an hour and five minutes :) Really going to rule…)
talk soon!
hope hamamatsu is treating you well!
kenley
@jeannine:
yes, there is SO much on meaning and language that says that objects in the world are external and seperate from human understanding. the idea that a rock is a rock without the human interpretation of it is VERY prevelant and all together, i think, wrong. this incorrect interpretation of objects in the world might be considered `platonism`. this post was more in effort to define what platonism is, and how its entirely detrimental to the problem of meaning.
@kenley:
i DONT understand quantum physics, HOWEVER, the problems i think people have with quantum physics might be in what those specific theories are assuming, their epistemic foundations. thats all i meant ;)
think about when youve ever seen a straightline, in the photo above, consider that even in the world, we know that rails, running parallel are entirely straight, but when viewing them in the distance, they meet. parallel lines then DO meet, depending on perspective, the assumed epistemilogical foundations. the question is then: what do we assume when we maintain that parallel lines can:t meet? what perspective are we taking? etc.
okay, understood - the assumption that parallel lines meet what was missing :), I’ll think more about it… good thinking material during the drive to work.
Speaking of things to do during the way to work… I just finished Episode 13 of “Into the Score”… it’s entirely an interview with Andrew Aversa, Judge of OCR and coordinator of the “Final Fantasy VII: Voices of the Lifestream” project (an FF7 arrangement project, 3.5 hours of music, over 45 pieces arranged… amazing… http://ff7.ocremix.org)
It has potential to be one of the best episodes in the podcast, you’ll love it. Try listening to the project first then hearing the podcast, so amazing. Andrew Aversa (”zircon”) is someone I really look up to, so it’s amazing to interview him and talk to him about music, mixing, VGM… unbelievable. It was the perfect interview.
Oh I’m well aware of the work of platonism…or is it just that i read that word and assigned meaning to it base on the context of your explanation? Riddle me that!!!
Boring!