Thomas said:
namaste Thomas,
thank you for the post.
Generally in the West the concept of metaphysics has move beyond Aristolean concepts - much in the same way that 'gnosis' has moved beyond its Platonic definition.
The term itself means 'beyond physics' and thus applies to all speculation on First and final Causes - even if Aristotle's view was somewhat limited in that regard.
Not strictly necessary I think - but again this is a matter of perspective.
fair enough.
The Traditionalist School hold that metaphysics is beyond all form and all definition - and thus beyond theism as the expression of a personal God, hence their, and my, deployment od such terms as 'Absolute', 'Infinite' and 'All-Possible' in discussion - not ideal terms, perhaps, but the best we have to hand.
fair enough. using this rather broad definition, i'd ask for you to consider that this could apply to a non-theistic tradition. you don't have to agree to it as a principle, rather, for the sake of conversation.
Sorry - I'm not sure I understand you here.
my apologies. i think that this represents a fundamental difference in our world view. generally speaking, the western world has what is known as a mechanistic world view. everything was made from something else, you can find the smallest bit of it and it was made for a purpose.
this is expressed quite well in the modern device called the computer. i shall, for the sake of brevity, presume that you are a) conversant with how a computer works b) know the history of the machine to a small degree. if this isn't the case, please let me know and i'll fill in the gaps.
the pc is working in a binary way. 1 or 0. On or Off. Y or N. A or B.
new technologies, however, have changed the way that computers work. there is a mathmatical concept called Fuzzy Logic which has been applied to computers, in particular things like fans and atmospheric control systems. this is a fascinating field of exploration and, as you'll read and discover, a tremendous potential lies herein.
http://www.emsl.pnl.gov/proj/neuron/fuzzy/what.html
i'll post a snippet from the site:
Fuzzy set theory implements classes or groupings of data with boundaries that are not sharply defined (i.e., fuzzy). Any methodology or theory implementing "crisp" definitions such as classical set theory, arithmetic, and programming, may be "fuzzified" by generalizing the concept of a crisp set to a fuzzy set with blurred boundaries. The benefit of extending crisp theory and analysis methods to fuzzy techniques is the strength in solving real-world problems, which inevitably entail some degree of imprecision and noise in the variables and parameters measured and processed for the application. Accordingly, linguistic variables are a critical aspect of some fuzzy logic applications, where general terms such a "large," "medium," and "small" are each used to capture a range of numerical values. While similar to conventional quantization, fuzzy logic allows these stratified sets to overlap (e.g., a 85 kilogram man may be classified in both the "large" and "medium" categories, with varying degrees of belonging or membership to each group). Fuzzy set theory encompasses fuzzy logic, fuzzy arithmetic, fuzzy mathematical programming, fuzzy topology, fuzzy graph theory, and fuzzy data analysis, though the term fuzzy logic is often used to describe all of these.
a more comprehensive reading can be done here:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/logic-fuzzy/
But surely this posits God as contained within his own creation?
i believe that i had stipulated that previously for the sake of our convesation. however, God is only one of 6 potential 1st Causes and is not the default position.
In a recent TV programme (on the soul, as it happens) they spoke to a number of physicists who all agreed that there is something 'fundamentally missing' from Quantum Physics as it is currently understood - so in my view a science that is acknowledged as incomplete by its own scientists displays man's limit - not God's.
hmm... i would disagree. one of the reasons that we can put so much trust in science is that it can falsify itself. if a theory is proven wrong, it is discarded and a new one is adopted, until it is proven wrong. this is a very good method of establishing trust. man never claims to know everything that there is to know. we do, however, claim that we can know what we can observe to a reasonable degree of accurracy.
the television show reference, though, is a bit though to take without any sources
not saying that you're wrong mon ami, rather, i would like to learn for myself. that's how we Buddhists do things
The notion of 'free will' exists within the bounds of possibility - which from a Christian perspective is determined by the Creator. Thus God need not know whether you turn left or right, the point being that left or right are the only possibilities available in this cosmos - as determined by God.
hmm... don't we have any Calvinists on this board yet? in any event, they are Christians and they don't really believe in free will like you are describing in the least.
i, however, believe that it is fact.
