Existence
Existence is nearly impossible to define. To exist, is "to live or be real or have being" (according to the Longman's Dictionary of Contemporary English, 1988), but even then, what is real? Another check in the same dictionary for the word "real" will not help much either. Real is defined as "actually existing; not imaginary". For the purpose of this writing, it is better to treat what you are reading as existent or we will all end up going circles, like we have just did with the definitions in the dictionary.
The human mind has a diverse understanding of what existence is. From a toddler's point of view, if he can see something, that something exists, whether or not other people around him can see what he is seeing. From a pre-school child's point of view, if he cannot see what somebody else tells him to see, he will try to see it. From a student's point of view, it does not really matter whether he can see it or not, as long as the teacher says that something exists, he must accept it or he will not understand anything. From a graduate's point of view, it does not really matter what he thinks existence is because he had been through at least 16 years of education and they had been bombarded with a lot of conflicting ideas. From a working adult's point of view, the real world he is working in is what he calls the reality. From a dying person's point of view, if he lives to see the sunrise, he exists.
As we grow, our minds develop. We have no means of controlling how we want our minds to develop because we were born into a family which had been subjected to social conditioning for generations. Education has been the way of life and it is thus accepted. It has, in a way, opened and restricted our minds.
Science has one of the largest impact on the world as its ideas had been commercialised and every student attending formal education will have to learn that subject. Many people cannot accept scientific theories because the theories do not seem to provide an explanation for what scientists claim to have explained. An example will be Newton's laws of gravitation. The way it has been argued by people to proof its existence is this: Logically speaking, since we can see the apple falling down the tree, the only probable reason will be that gravity exists. Those who believe in science will accept that gravity exists, but those who do not believe in science will say that gravity is simply a ghost - a phantom in the minds of people.
The following is an extract from Robert Pirsig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance will further elaborate on that idea. The father tells his son that he does not believe in ghosts because 'they are unscientific. They contain no matter and have no energy and therefore according to the laws of science, do not exist except in people's minds. Of course, the laws of science contain no matter and have no energy either and therefore do not exist except in people's minds. It's best to refuse to believe in either ghosts or the laws of science.' The son, now confused, wonders if his father has wandered off into nihilism:
"So you don't believe in ghosts or science?"
"No, I do believe in ghosts."
"What?"
"The laws of physics and logic, the number system, the principle of algebraic substitution. These are ghosts. We just believe in them so thoroughly they seem real. For example it seems completely natural to presume that gravitation and the law of gravity existed before Isaac Newton. It would sound nutty to think that until the seventeenth century there was no gravity."
"Of course."
"So, before the beginning of the Earth, before people, etc., the law of gravity existed. Sitting there, having no mass of its own, no energy, and not existing in anyone's mind."
"Right."
"Then what has a thing to do to be nonexistent? It has just passed every test of nonexistence there is. You cannot think of a single attribute of nonexistence that the law of gravity didn't have, or a single scientific attribute of existence it did have. I predict that if you think about it long enough, you will go round and round until you realize that the law of gravity did not exist before Isaac Newton. So the law of gravity exists nowhere except in people's heads. It is a ghost!"
From the extract, readers would be probed to think about the paradox. The problem now is that we only argue base on two states, true or false. If we can see the sun, we will say that the sun exists. Conversely, is it necessarily acceptable? If you blindfold your eyes, you will not be able to see the sun, so does the sun still exist? A possible argument will be that it is only a momentary disappearance, so the sun still exists, but what about the visually handicapped? Does the sun exist in their minds? They hear from others that the sun exists and they feel the heat (from an unobservable source) they presume to be the sun. On that basis, they too accept that the sun exists.
Back to the unresolved conflict about what gravity is, most people accept it because "the scientists have proven it" or "we are not floating in air" or "it has been accepted for generations" ... The general idea is that people do not really deny what scientific theories claim. The human mind's weakness is that it believes things if the things put forward are convincing. The system of thoughts goes like this: I can see that all objects are pulled to the ground. I can see that I am standing upright on the ground. I can see that astronauts float in space. Therefore, I am convinced that gravity exists. The conception of what exists becomes what I cannot see but the effects it has on objects that I can see. The consensus will be not classifying its existence into true or false states, but accepting that there is probably another state in between the two, accepting the word like any other noun in the dictionary, and not bothering about its definition because the definition is circular. What is gravity? It is the force that pulls all objects towards the centre of the earth. Why are objects being pulled to the centre of the earth? It is because of gravity!
What we have just discussed is only one of the debatable topics in the arena of Science. Other topics include magnetic and electric fields, atoms, molecules and charges. Fortunately, the science belief is still alive. It still exists because people accept the scientific way of reasoning, logic in scientific terms. The belief that scientific theories explain the way things work, the faith that scientific theories are always correct, and the way the word existence is defined in the people's minds, has allowed logic to play a part in science.
Mathematics is not exactly related to Science, but Science is related to Mathematics. Did the sentence sound awkward to you? This is an example of sets. "Mathematics is not exactly related to science" means Mathematics and Science are considerably independent elements in the set. "Science is related to Mathematics", means Science has a part of itself overlapped with Mathematics. A Venn diagram will show that the two states are impossible to exist at the same time. The alternative way to interpret the sentence will be to play around with the word "not exactly". Even then, the degree of relation seems to be smaller in the first case. The statement can hold true, defying the Venn diagrams, by viewing the statement as one being said by a Mathematician who views Mathematics highly and thinks that Science is not as superior. The impression created will be that Mathematics and Science are not related, one is superior, one is not, but Science uses mathematical concepts, so it is related to Mathematics. To compromise, the word "not exactly" has been inserted.
We have just proven the existence of an improbable case by changing the perspective the statement is viewed from. In Mathematics, people find it easier to accept because the theories involve tangible numbers, even when dealing with complex numbers. It is amazing how Mathematicians can come up with real numbers to represent imaginary numbers. As usual, there are people who cannot accept the concept of imaginary numbers. Surprisingly, the existence of complex numbers need not be proven to convince people that complex numbers exist. It is just a system of numbers created to satisfy the human's desire to know what the square root of minus one is. It brings great joy when someone asks, "What is the square root of minus one?" and one can proudly say, "It is the complex number i." Again, it does not seem to explain, because the question "What is i?" yields the answer "It is the square root of minus one."
The number system has expanded from natural numbers, to decimals, to real, to imaginary. If we look back at all these creations, we will discover that Man has created all sort of ideas to explain the unexplainable things. In so doing, Man is just naming things that are unknown to him and hinging his belief on his own faith.
The question of existence is very much a question of faith. We can talk about Mathematics and Science, what we believe in, but we have neglected the part that has helped us arrived at our decision. We believe that what we believe in is true, the one and only truth in our being. Of course, the system of reasoning to arrive at the conclusion, we all know, is logic. However, logic alone will not make people convinced with what they have to believe. Ultimately, it is making people believe in the statements put forward that counts. As mentioned in the earlier examples, there are logical proofs to prove the existence of certain things, but because certain people do not have the faith that it is true, they cannot accept the proposed idea.
The faith in Man is influenced by the values he holds. In Darwin's efforts to convince people that human beings evolved from smaller sea organisms, certain religious people violently objected as it opposed their belief that God created Man. To them, they had been conditioned to accept that God created man because it was stated in their Holy Scriptures, which have existed long before Darwin proposed his idea. Using the same argument as Pirsig, just because Darwin proposed his idea later than the scripture does not make his less plausible. This is a good example to show that the values of a person will affect his beliefs. Darwin did give a logical proof on how he arrived at his theory, but people who do not have the faith in his words did not believe in him.
Similarly, Einstein's Theory of Relativity calls for faith. The term "relative" has been widely used to show the level of thinking in a person. By saying that time is relative, we are questioning what reality is, and in turn, what existence is. Few people really know what time dilation is about, but human beings want to sound learnt, and hence the abuse of the phrase "time is relative". If a person says, "there is no absolute truth", implying that truth is relative, it shows the "learnt-ness" in a person. Sadly, it shows that people cannot get decided on what reality is, and what existence is.
Logic is a subconscious reasoning process in our minds. We hardly take notice of how we arrive at our decisions. We listen to how others present their ideas, think about whether their ideas are conflicting with our values, and finally, the dose of faith which we see whether or not we have in them. We can subscribe to certain ideas and live by certain beliefs, but ultimately, we exist on the basis that we are thinking, the logical way.
The human mind has a diverse understanding of what existence is. From a toddler's point of view, if he can see something, that something exists, whether or not other people around him can see what he is seeing. From a pre-school child's point of view, if he cannot see what somebody else tells him to see, he will try to see it. From a student's point of view, it does not really matter whether he can see it or not, as long as the teacher says that something exists, he must accept it or he will not understand anything. From a graduate's point of view, it does not really matter what he thinks existence is because he had been through at least 16 years of education and they had been bombarded with a lot of conflicting ideas. From a working adult's point of view, the real world he is working in is what he calls the reality. From a dying person's point of view, if he lives to see the sunrise, he exists.
As we grow, our minds develop. We have no means of controlling how we want our minds to develop because we were born into a family which had been subjected to social conditioning for generations. Education has been the way of life and it is thus accepted. It has, in a way, opened and restricted our minds.
Science has one of the largest impact on the world as its ideas had been commercialised and every student attending formal education will have to learn that subject. Many people cannot accept scientific theories because the theories do not seem to provide an explanation for what scientists claim to have explained. An example will be Newton's laws of gravitation. The way it has been argued by people to proof its existence is this: Logically speaking, since we can see the apple falling down the tree, the only probable reason will be that gravity exists. Those who believe in science will accept that gravity exists, but those who do not believe in science will say that gravity is simply a ghost - a phantom in the minds of people.
The following is an extract from Robert Pirsig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance will further elaborate on that idea. The father tells his son that he does not believe in ghosts because 'they are unscientific. They contain no matter and have no energy and therefore according to the laws of science, do not exist except in people's minds. Of course, the laws of science contain no matter and have no energy either and therefore do not exist except in people's minds. It's best to refuse to believe in either ghosts or the laws of science.' The son, now confused, wonders if his father has wandered off into nihilism:
"So you don't believe in ghosts or science?"
"No, I do believe in ghosts."
"What?"
"The laws of physics and logic, the number system, the principle of algebraic substitution. These are ghosts. We just believe in them so thoroughly they seem real. For example it seems completely natural to presume that gravitation and the law of gravity existed before Isaac Newton. It would sound nutty to think that until the seventeenth century there was no gravity."
"Of course."
"So, before the beginning of the Earth, before people, etc., the law of gravity existed. Sitting there, having no mass of its own, no energy, and not existing in anyone's mind."
"Right."
"Then what has a thing to do to be nonexistent? It has just passed every test of nonexistence there is. You cannot think of a single attribute of nonexistence that the law of gravity didn't have, or a single scientific attribute of existence it did have. I predict that if you think about it long enough, you will go round and round until you realize that the law of gravity did not exist before Isaac Newton. So the law of gravity exists nowhere except in people's heads. It is a ghost!"
From the extract, readers would be probed to think about the paradox. The problem now is that we only argue base on two states, true or false. If we can see the sun, we will say that the sun exists. Conversely, is it necessarily acceptable? If you blindfold your eyes, you will not be able to see the sun, so does the sun still exist? A possible argument will be that it is only a momentary disappearance, so the sun still exists, but what about the visually handicapped? Does the sun exist in their minds? They hear from others that the sun exists and they feel the heat (from an unobservable source) they presume to be the sun. On that basis, they too accept that the sun exists.
Back to the unresolved conflict about what gravity is, most people accept it because "the scientists have proven it" or "we are not floating in air" or "it has been accepted for generations" ... The general idea is that people do not really deny what scientific theories claim. The human mind's weakness is that it believes things if the things put forward are convincing. The system of thoughts goes like this: I can see that all objects are pulled to the ground. I can see that I am standing upright on the ground. I can see that astronauts float in space. Therefore, I am convinced that gravity exists. The conception of what exists becomes what I cannot see but the effects it has on objects that I can see. The consensus will be not classifying its existence into true or false states, but accepting that there is probably another state in between the two, accepting the word like any other noun in the dictionary, and not bothering about its definition because the definition is circular. What is gravity? It is the force that pulls all objects towards the centre of the earth. Why are objects being pulled to the centre of the earth? It is because of gravity!
What we have just discussed is only one of the debatable topics in the arena of Science. Other topics include magnetic and electric fields, atoms, molecules and charges. Fortunately, the science belief is still alive. It still exists because people accept the scientific way of reasoning, logic in scientific terms. The belief that scientific theories explain the way things work, the faith that scientific theories are always correct, and the way the word existence is defined in the people's minds, has allowed logic to play a part in science.
Mathematics is not exactly related to Science, but Science is related to Mathematics. Did the sentence sound awkward to you? This is an example of sets. "Mathematics is not exactly related to science" means Mathematics and Science are considerably independent elements in the set. "Science is related to Mathematics", means Science has a part of itself overlapped with Mathematics. A Venn diagram will show that the two states are impossible to exist at the same time. The alternative way to interpret the sentence will be to play around with the word "not exactly". Even then, the degree of relation seems to be smaller in the first case. The statement can hold true, defying the Venn diagrams, by viewing the statement as one being said by a Mathematician who views Mathematics highly and thinks that Science is not as superior. The impression created will be that Mathematics and Science are not related, one is superior, one is not, but Science uses mathematical concepts, so it is related to Mathematics. To compromise, the word "not exactly" has been inserted.
We have just proven the existence of an improbable case by changing the perspective the statement is viewed from. In Mathematics, people find it easier to accept because the theories involve tangible numbers, even when dealing with complex numbers. It is amazing how Mathematicians can come up with real numbers to represent imaginary numbers. As usual, there are people who cannot accept the concept of imaginary numbers. Surprisingly, the existence of complex numbers need not be proven to convince people that complex numbers exist. It is just a system of numbers created to satisfy the human's desire to know what the square root of minus one is. It brings great joy when someone asks, "What is the square root of minus one?" and one can proudly say, "It is the complex number i." Again, it does not seem to explain, because the question "What is i?" yields the answer "It is the square root of minus one."
The number system has expanded from natural numbers, to decimals, to real, to imaginary. If we look back at all these creations, we will discover that Man has created all sort of ideas to explain the unexplainable things. In so doing, Man is just naming things that are unknown to him and hinging his belief on his own faith.
The question of existence is very much a question of faith. We can talk about Mathematics and Science, what we believe in, but we have neglected the part that has helped us arrived at our decision. We believe that what we believe in is true, the one and only truth in our being. Of course, the system of reasoning to arrive at the conclusion, we all know, is logic. However, logic alone will not make people convinced with what they have to believe. Ultimately, it is making people believe in the statements put forward that counts. As mentioned in the earlier examples, there are logical proofs to prove the existence of certain things, but because certain people do not have the faith that it is true, they cannot accept the proposed idea.
The faith in Man is influenced by the values he holds. In Darwin's efforts to convince people that human beings evolved from smaller sea organisms, certain religious people violently objected as it opposed their belief that God created Man. To them, they had been conditioned to accept that God created man because it was stated in their Holy Scriptures, which have existed long before Darwin proposed his idea. Using the same argument as Pirsig, just because Darwin proposed his idea later than the scripture does not make his less plausible. This is a good example to show that the values of a person will affect his beliefs. Darwin did give a logical proof on how he arrived at his theory, but people who do not have the faith in his words did not believe in him.
Similarly, Einstein's Theory of Relativity calls for faith. The term "relative" has been widely used to show the level of thinking in a person. By saying that time is relative, we are questioning what reality is, and in turn, what existence is. Few people really know what time dilation is about, but human beings want to sound learnt, and hence the abuse of the phrase "time is relative". If a person says, "there is no absolute truth", implying that truth is relative, it shows the "learnt-ness" in a person. Sadly, it shows that people cannot get decided on what reality is, and what existence is.
Logic is a subconscious reasoning process in our minds. We hardly take notice of how we arrive at our decisions. We listen to how others present their ideas, think about whether their ideas are conflicting with our values, and finally, the dose of faith which we see whether or not we have in them. We can subscribe to certain ideas and live by certain beliefs, but ultimately, we exist on the basis that we are thinking, the logical way.
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