Is it merely Trivially True?
November 26th, 2007, search relatedRelated posts :: Is it merely Trivially True? :: Is it merely Trivially True? :: Is it merely Trivially True? :: Is it merely Trivially True?
> >>Michael Eldred wrote:
>
>>> >ME: If one has already accepted predicate logic as given, then Axiom 0
>>> >is trivially true. But I do not accept predicate logic as given, nor
>>> >the concept of truth/falsity that pertains to predicate logic. For the
>>> >sake of argument, I have shown that even allowing Axiom 0 to stand
>>> >still leads to being. But more philosophically, I have already
>>> >indicated why Axiom 0 cannot be accepted as a self-evident axiom: one
>>> >has to go back to the originary phenomena. There it can be seen that
>>> >the subject/predicate structure breaks down and that the question,
>>> >”what?”, let alone the question, “what am I?”, again becomes malleable,
>>> >full of mystery.
>
>
>Joe repeats:
>
>>>the question ‘what am I?’ never ceased to be full of mystery. why?
>>>because I know that I am; but, not what I am.
>
>
>Allen clarifies:
>
>> An oversimplification:
>>
>> How can you know “that” you are without presuming a “what” standing
>> behind or inside the “that”? And, it seems to me, that the
>> presumption of substance inevitably undermines the mystery, which
>> then remains only a pose. The only means of actually preserving the
>> mystery in its most entertaining form( so we can be sure it’s the
>> real thing) is simply to keep to the question: Why is there
>> something rather than nothing? Almost every time I remind my
>> introductory class of that question, we are able to immediately, for
>> the moment, once again, discover philosophy. And then we can go on.
>
>Exactly, Allen. Being a that(ness), that something is, [is] a kind of what
>(what something is) that distinguishes, differences its self not so much
>from another what(ness) but from nothing, non-being, and as such [is] be-ing
>its self and nothing else. That I (or anything else) am [is] an irruption of
>be-ing within nothingness; the logos discloses this in (for example, and in
>this very example) predicational speech (I am, the tree is, Joe is, etc); it
>uncovers the irruption of somethingness in the face of nothingness: nothing
>less. The question then arises as to how predicational speech (as an example
>of the logos) can perform this ‘magic’, how (merely?) human (what other kind
>is there?) speech can be so explosively disclosive. I am insofar as I speak
>(think) — a crude rendering of Cartesian metaphysics; and what do I say in
>my be-ing (as a speaking (thinking) thing): simply, that I speak. Where is
>the knowing being that knows that I speak (and says that I speak)? Is such a
>knowing being behind or underlying or overlooking the speech that says that
>I speak (that I am qua speaking thatnesses, that I am rather than nothing
>{silence})? Is it a matter of ‘knowledge’ at all (that I am insofar as I
>speak)? Disclosure (logos) discloses: is that enough for thinking to begin
>thinking? Thinking what? Logos its self? Is it what we speak of (about),
>what we sub-ject, or from whence such speech irrupts the silence (to what we
>are sub-ject) that matters in philosophical speech? What we disclose or that
>we disclose; or are they (the what and the that) bound together in an other
>unity that is hidden or sheltered or encrypted by the very thatness of
>speech?
>
>and another very good morning to you all
How do you repeat a good morning, or better, how do you know that
this good morning is anything like any other good morning? Of course
you don’t, but you say what you said by way of nostalgically evoking
that other good morning, of which we all have some recollection (even
though it is different in each case) and out of your usual gregarious
generosity take that recollected good morning and project it into an
historical future (Heidegger, “Was is das –die Philosophie?” 41),
that can be offered as a wish for you, for us, for all of us.
So the “whatness” here is as it is in all cases, a phenomenon of
speaking, and that is the path of interesting questioning on the
matter, which I barely began: What is that which we call “”another
very good morning to you all.”? What a phenomenal thing it is to say
what you said and have it be what it is.
Reminds me of the first good morning. “And God saw the [morning]
and said, “What a good [morning] it is!” Even though no subsequent
morning has been as good, we name an upcoming morning another very
good morning and so find our place together in being historical, not
as gods but as men, with the capacity to name the whatness(what
Heidegger calls the “quiddity”) of a thing what it is in our speaking
of it.
Of course, all this is possible because there is something rather
than nothing, something we can call “X” and have it be “x” at least
in our speaking of it. This, of course began also in Chapter One
where God (same one I believe) brings all beings before man to be
named. And “as you name them,” He says, “So they will be.”
Well, here we are.
Best regards,
Allen
