That is not what is it for? My view i guess is a Plato kind.
Well, Plato and Kant and Christianity regards the intelligible world as both good and moral ... although how they integrate existence into the intelligible is a different matter.
yet to review; it appears as if to use 'noumenon' is to describe or lean on the concept of God. Or purely Existence itself.
Well ... I would say that the noumenal covers that which the intelligible can speculate upon, but not prove empirically.
One is not obliged to assume that what lies beyond one's comprehension is the Deity, be it a Christian God, or any other ... likewise, to elevate 'existence' to the level of noumena implies there's more to existence than what is comprehendable via its phenomena ... and then one would have to determine what constitutes existence at the level of noumena, which would rule out light, energy, matter, time ... etc. and you're in to speculation again.
Isn't that was knowledge assists mankind with; Comprehending phenomenon? Associating? Describing all the while evolving.
Yes it does ... but is it the be-all and end-all of human existence, or is it just something we do ... man's happiness does not depend upon knowledge per se, and I dare say most of the human race would rather be happy than knowledgeable ... (although I'm not proposing ignorance as an escape from reality, or a virtue).
But perhaps I have to tread carefully ... to me it seems you ascribe to the process of MET something more than the sum of its parts, as it were ... and you factor knowledge into the formula ... so I would suggest that you're doing just as a theologian does, in speculating on the nature of reality ... and maybe I've got this all wrong, but to me it seems you're saying that the empirical phenomena is all that there is, and that must be God, because there's nothing else but energy in various combinations and degrees of activity ...
and to suggest 'knowing' as in a gnostic approach is pure, then why do people need to learn anything gnostic?
Well 'gnosis' in the wider sense means 'more interior' ... so I would say that knowledge, which is words ... is a construct around and about something, whereas gnosis is the experience of the thing itself ... not the description of the thing ...
I once recall talking to a sailor, about icebergs ... so we're swapping facts about icebergs ... then he said, "of course, you can smell 'em, musty things ... " and I realised for all my knowledge, he had experienced an iceberg — and that's what counts.
It's like a nice cup of tea ... I can explain it to you, the in-depth knowledge of the plant, boiling water, the principle of infusion, milk and sugar ... but nothing matches the taste of a cup of tea, that's real, the knowledge, in that sense, isn't ... it's necessary data if you want to make a cup of tea, though.
Knowledge will never reach the point where it is the thing about which it informs, if that makes sense ... I think man utilises knowledge to try and do just that.
A Catholic priest said in a homily "Go out and look at the sky on a dark and cloudless night ... look at the infinitessimal depths, the dimension ... then factor in time ... infinity in another direction ... it's magnificence is stark, stupendous, breathtaking ... heart-stoppingly, achingly beautiful ... and yet you, you little thing, you little thing that lasts less than a spark in the history of time, you can take it all in ... and more ... "
If your idea is pure then we should each be able to sit in a closet right after birth and know existence in all her noumenon
Who's to say some can't, or don't ... I would say the state of bliss is just that ... and that suggests there's a world of difference between 'knowledge' and 'knowing'.
the progression to knowledge has currently peaked and the only method of reaching the next plateau is a paradigm shift....
Perhaps you're right ... perhaps the next step is being, in all its simplicity, not knowledge, in all its complexity.
How can you say that? It is like fibbing just because you 'will not' be honest.
Not at all ... I've said no more than many philosophers have said ... Anaximander, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Anselm, Aquinas, why, the Asiatic traditions — the Dao, Buddhism — both say pretty much the same, there is this world, and there is other ... you're just showing your prejudice, if I read you right, in insisting that 'this' is all there is?
other than you can't see the big picture, and happy to continue in the 'can't understand' mindset.
And yet I'm saying the picture is bigger than the one you paint ... curious, isn't it?
is that your attraction to Kant? Is it because it has a ring to being complacent?
Oh, hardly! I'm Catholic, remember, not a Kantian — we reckon he's wrong, and a whole heap of trouble! ... if anything a NeoPlatonist, although I'd like to say I'm a Thomist, but I've a long way to go yet ... but regardless, I believe the noumena can be known ... if it chooses to be known ...
Thomas