- 29 Nov 2017 22:34
#14866792
I think it’s a matter of finding a point of equilibrium between intuition and rationality. Intuition left to run wild is arbitrary and destructive while cold rationality separated from intuition or compassion will enclose us in a deathlike shell devoid of life. Or it may be a matter of transcending the duality of intuition and rationality to be whole.
I don't believe the world can be known by rationality, not by axiomatic systems and not by laws of nature. The laws that apply in our part of the universe may not apply elsewhere under different conditions. Anyways, since the universe cannot be finite, we cannot arrive at complete knowledge by a binary rationality build on the duality of finite/infinite, being/non-being, small/big, etc. It is only by transcending the duality of our rational thinking that we can intuit the truth.
Our rational thinking is conditioned by utilitarian needs such as a primate's need to know that he grasps a fruit or does not grasp a fruit, where the English word "grasp" (Greifen/Begreifen in German, saisir in French) both mean to have and to know (the Chinese pictogram for to have shows a hand grasping a piece of meat). This duality of our rational thinking has determined our thought patterns because it was essential for our survival, but it cannot answer primary questions.
I think so. Or should I say I don't think so
I wonder if Descartes was right when he said "I think therefore I am?" If thinking, ie. the act of reflecting on reality, distances us from "just being" and splits the world into thinker and thought object, it may be more correct to say that "I think therefore I am not." But then thinking too may be a form of being.
Potemkin wrote:Indeed. But such intuitions must always be consistent with rational thought, even though they cannot be reached by rational thought. After all, Goedel's Incompleteness Theorem may have demonstrated that any sufficiently complex system of propositions can (and in fact must) contain propositions which cannot be derived from its axioms, but those unreachable propositions are always consistent with propositions which can be derived from the axioms; in other words, they are still part of the axiomatic system. Intuition can, after all, lead us astray, and rationality and logic can act as a check on our wilder flights of fancy.
I think it’s a matter of finding a point of equilibrium between intuition and rationality. Intuition left to run wild is arbitrary and destructive while cold rationality separated from intuition or compassion will enclose us in a deathlike shell devoid of life. Or it may be a matter of transcending the duality of intuition and rationality to be whole.
I don't believe the world can be known by rationality, not by axiomatic systems and not by laws of nature. The laws that apply in our part of the universe may not apply elsewhere under different conditions. Anyways, since the universe cannot be finite, we cannot arrive at complete knowledge by a binary rationality build on the duality of finite/infinite, being/non-being, small/big, etc. It is only by transcending the duality of our rational thinking that we can intuit the truth.
Our rational thinking is conditioned by utilitarian needs such as a primate's need to know that he grasps a fruit or does not grasp a fruit, where the English word "grasp" (Greifen/Begreifen in German, saisir in French) both mean to have and to know (the Chinese pictogram for to have shows a hand grasping a piece of meat). This duality of our rational thinking has determined our thought patterns because it was essential for our survival, but it cannot answer primary questions.
RhetoricThug wrote:Finding peace within the paradox beyond everything (1) and nothing (0).
I think so. Or should I say I don't think so
I wonder if Descartes was right when he said "I think therefore I am?" If thinking, ie. the act of reflecting on reality, distances us from "just being" and splits the world into thinker and thought object, it may be more correct to say that "I think therefore I am not." But then thinking too may be a form of being.