Defending premises of TS argumemt part 2

the Argument:

1. Any rational, coherent, and meaningful view of the universe must of necessity presuppose organizing principles (Ops)

2. OP's are summed up in TS

3. Modern Thought rejects TS outright or takes out all aspects of mind.

4. Therefore, Modern thought fails to provide a rational, coherent, and meaningful view of the universe.

6. Therefore universal mind, offers the best understanding of TS

7. Concept of God unites TS with universal mind therefore offers best explanation

for a view that is Rational, Coherent, and Meaningful (RCM).

Defending the premises of the argument

(3) Modern Thought rejects TSED

It would be more technically correct to say postmodern thought rejects TS. But modern thought may keep TS's such as reason but doesn't allow them to be connected to mind. I use the term “modern” here to mean contemporary, no reference to the academic schools. I've already described this process. They reject God but leave in place an organizing principle in terms of laws of physics as a mindless principle that can take the place of a creator. It is impossible to do without OPs, all attempts to do so have ended in establishment of a new organizing principle: such as the Derrida and ethics examples I just got through describing (see chapter 2 for greater depth). We cannot organize without a principle of organizing. Chapter two is all about this example of Derrida and ethics. The way the OP's are summed up in TS's is hierarchical and suggests the basic reason for hierarchical ordering.

Modern thought either reduces the TS to laws of physics or rejects it out right but in either case fails to unite the grounding function of the TS in such a way as to explain a coherent hierarchical ordering in the universe with an understanding of what it means to be. I don't know who invented the term “transcendental signifier,” but Derrida took it over in a sense and made it famous. It actually refers to any universal concept in human understanding. There are so many TS's because it's not limited to one notion, but also because it refers to or includes the ultimate first principle. That means it's basically about the areas of reality of which we know so little, thus there are many different ideas about it. Yet the hierarchical nature implies a single first principle. There are many different ideas, God, the life force, the over soul, the Buddha mind, being itself, but they all point to a single first principle at the top, The discussion is always about which one: reason, logic, math, God.

(4) Therefore, Modern thought fails to provide a rational, coherent, and meaningful view of the universe.

How is modern thought incoherent, irrational, and meaningless? It has a lot of coherent and a degree of rationality but it's missing certain key elements in those areas, that works to undermine the meaning of the whole. The major incoherence is the inability to explain hierarchical ordering, the OP's and the TS. There are clearly OP's and they point to some higher framework of rationality and meaning but modern Western thought cuts off the top by removing mind from the equation, thus there are many lose ends and no ultimate meaning.

Modern thought seeks a single principle, an ἀρχή that explains everything, (or at least it explains quantum gravity) but not itself. There's no connection between the rationality of the system and it's existence since it's cut off from mind. The forces of blind chance are the only guide, and that may be all that's required, and yet minds are capable of understanding so much more and of putting the system as a whole into a rational framework but one that ultimately has no rationale.

Moreover, there is no explanation for reality. There's no way modern thought can even pose the question “why is there something rather than nothing?” That kind of question is hard enough to answer anyway but with the kind of metaphysical assumptions modern science makes the question can’t even be asked. That stifles thought along the lines of anything that transcends the closed realm of discourse within a society given to a narrow truth regime. There is no accounting for the law-like regularity we find in the universe. Physical laws have even been demoted from actual laws to mere descriptions. Thus though they describe this law-like regularity we are not allowed to call it a law. Thus the universe is irrational and the real explanation is just a lose end. Whitehead observed the irrationality.

We are content with superficial orderings form diverse arbitrary starting points. ... sciene which is employed in their development [modern thought] is based upon a philosophy which asserts that physical causation is supreme, and which disjoins the physical cause from the final end. It is not popular to dwell upon the absolute contradiction here involved."[Whitehead was an atheist[1] 

There is no understanding as to why we are here or why reality is so ordered hierarchically and to ask the question no longer makes sense because modern thought has learned to content itself with lose ends. Organizing is always hierarchical, and in comprehending the hierarchy of epistemic answers there are several principles that can be understood as transcendental. Many of these are good candidates for first principles. Mathematics, reason, logic, any of these might be seen as the basic principle upon which all knowledge is grounded. Secondly, humans have always tried to understand a means of conceptualizing and connecting to the ἀρχή (are-kay—first principle) or the TS. In every culture, age, thought tradition there has been some form of first axiom that grounds all knowledge and life. In reasoning Aristotle recognized an axiom.

In every systematic inquiry (methods) where there are first principles, or causes, or elements, knowledge and science result from acquiring knowledge of these; for we think we know something just in case we acquire knowledge of the primary causes, the primary first principles, all the way to the elements. It is clear, then, that in the science of nature as elsewhere, we should try first to determine questions about the first principles. The naturally proper direction of our road is from things better known and clearer to us, to things that are clearer and better known by nature; for the things known to us are not the same as the things known unconditionally (haplôs). Hence it is necessary for us to progress, following this procedure, from the things that are less clear by nature, but clearer to us, towards things that are clearer and better known by nature.[2] 

Axioms or first principles, in philosophy are called a priori, they are foundational propositions that cannot be deduced from other propositions. But there appears to be an equivocation in this line of thought. Propositions of reasoning and concepts of God are two different things. There is a connection, however, between propositions of first principle and the God concept, and this is connected to the TSED. First, God is the ultimate first principle. God is the top of the metaphysical hierarchy (that is axiomatic). Thus any proposition of first principle would bear an intimate relation to the God concept (if we understand God as the TSED). That is essentially what is being said when we describe God in terms of metaphysical hierarchy, or in terms of modal function. Secondly God would be the ultimate first principle and all other first principles would derive their their being and function from God.

What is the meaning of the phrase of this above premise: [modern thought] Modern thought fails to provide a rational, coherent, and meaningful view of the universe? It fails to unite the grounding function of the TS in such a way as to explain a coherent hierarchical ordering in the universe with an understanding of what it means to be. Modern thought explains the behavior of the universe without reference to purpose or goal. Things are not moving toward a desired end, they are just moving. If order results out of chaos it's not the result of any purpose or plan. For that reason there is no assumption of meaning or purpose in being,. Thus no reason to explain what it means to be. As Sartre told us first we are then we decides what it means. We might suspect that the reason for failing to comprehend a purpose has to do with Laplace's lack of needing the God hypothesis (see above fn9). Did he lack the need of God purely as a physical explanation or did he not want the explanation? Was it the moral guidance of which he lacked the need? Or, if we assume this was a straightforward statement about physics, is it our lack of desire for guidance that contents us with the lack of explanation? In either case we go on with modern physics as though we have no need f that hypothesis. If true then why do we still seek the ultimate explanation? Why have we failed to find it? There is a failure because we recognize no higher meaning. Rather we recognize no single higher meaning but we all have various ideas about it. We are not satisfied or we would not keep looking. We are not willing to make some official meaning but the umpires of reality are still seeking a logos. Even when we decide we don't want meaning we don't want truth, meaning finds us anyway and our difference turns into differance and becomes a standard, a first principle. I think Perhaps this is because without overall meaning we seek a standard of guidance in place of meaning. Gudience suggests meaning.

Perhaps the most important aspect of incoherence is that we can't do without a TS. Derrida tried to eliminate the TS and wound up creating one (difference—with an a_a). "The constant danger of deconstuction is that it falls into the same kinds of hierarchies that it tries to expose. Derrida himself is quite aware of this danger--and his response--which is really a rhetorical response...is to multiply the names under which deconstruction traffics..."[3]

(5) minds organize and communicate meaning

I think that is self evident. That is what minds do and nothing else does it. I am not concerned here with how it it's done. If one chooses to argue “Dennette's multiple drafts” or consciousness is brain chemistry that is not the issue here. It doesn't disprove my argument. In fact since that requires hierarchical ordering it might help my argument.

(6) Therefore universal mind, offers the best understanding of TS

The reason modern thought is missing the unity (the TS, the nature of the universe, and meaning) is because it leaves out mind as the basis of the ἀρχή; minds organize and communicate meaning, thus modern thought is missing the connecting link between the TS and the nature of things (such as hierarchical organizing). Thomas Nagel in his book Mind and Cosmos (the subtitle: of the book says it-- “...the Materialist Noe-Darwinian Conception of Nature is Almost Certainly False”) argued that mind is the missing dimension with which modern thought refuses to deal, and this is why they can't solve the so called “hard problem.”[4] He did not argue that evolution is wrong but that the reductionist understanding will never unlock the hard problem because they can't admit there's an aspect of the world their methods can't grasp. He says it's not just about brain and mind but that “it invades our understanding of the entire cosmos and its history...a true appreciation of the difficulty of the problem must eventually change our conception of the place of the physical sciences in describing the natural order.”[5] Now this doesn’t prove that turning to introduce mind into the equation proves the solution, but it gives us reason to think that if leaving mind out of the equation is a major part of the problem, then including it is probably part of the best hope we have of solving it.

Even so the single first principle by itself is missing the dimension of mind. It's the dimension of mind that really enables an explanation uniting all the major areas of human being: the physical nature of the universe, the moral, and the existential or the dimension of our being where higher meaning and sheer existence meet. This is the full elucidation of being por soir. Science is wiling to stick with en soir. And that's acceptable because it's purpose is not to explain purpose of our being. That's a job for theology. Science really does not require the God hypothesis because it's function is not to unify these noetoic aspects of being. Being in itself is fine for scientific explanation. But we need more. Mind is the missing dimension because mind gives purpose. Consciousness seeks understanding, If the top of the metaphysical hierarchy is mind it would explain how meaning and moral precept and/or virtue could be part of the fabric of what is.

The elephant in the room on this premise is the insistence by physicalism and materialist thinkers that mind is merely brain activity. The skeptic will argue how can there be mind without a brain? The brain/mind reductionism has become so all pervasive in atheist circles any discussion of God or mind on the internet will result in that argument. There are major researchers who don't go along with the reductionist view. Raymond Tallis former professior at University of Manchester, denounces what he calls “neurohype,”  “the claims made on behalf of neuroscience in areas outside those in which it has any kind of explanatory power….”[6]

The fundamental assumption is that we are our brains and this, I will argue presently, is not true. But this is not the only reason why neuroscience does not tell us what human beings “really” are: it does not even tell us how the brain works, how bits of the brain work, or (even if you accept the dubious assumption that human living could be parcelled up into a number of discrete functions) which bit of the brain is responsible for which function. The rationale for thinking of the kind – “This bit of the brain houses that bit of us...” – is mind-numbingly simplistic.[7]

Aside from arguments based upon neuroscience there's an even better reason to discount the reductionists. The nature of the human mind is not the issue here. We are talking about the assumption of mind in understanding the TS. The nature of biological organisms is irrelevant. There is no justification for thinking of god as a big biological organism. God is not analogous to the most powerful being. He's not Zeus he's not superman. He's not really a “He.” “He's” not even analogous to the laws of physics. “He's” the basis upon which the laws of physics cohere. At that level we can consider God as pure mind or mind itself. It's not a mind, it is mind. The source and origin of mind.

The issue here is not the production of mind but the content. The notion of meaning necessitates purpose. Meaning is the communicated purpose involved in an utterance. That requires consciousness, self awareness and rational purpose. These are all qualities of mind. We can't prove mind behind the universe but we can show that there is no coherence between the various Op's if we assume naturalistic ends. Yet we can understand coherent unity between Ops, moral precepts, an existential meaning if we assume mind. If we assume a creating mind is responsible for hierarchical ordering we can see rationale for organizing, moral motions, and a purposive existence for humans all cohering in the unity of creative wisdom and purpose. That would seem to indicate that mind is the best explanation. Thomas Nagel points out that mind is the missing dimension that naturalism has left out.[8] Nagel was scathingly criticized as a creationist (he's an atheist) the man himself avowed in the work that he sought to make the naturalistic explanation more complete.[9] A theory of everything has to explain mind and reductionism merely explains it away. The point is that without linking purpose to meaning we have a sort of localized meaning, private truth good for each individual not related to the whole.  

I came into this world, I understood nothing, I saw many things what they meant they only meant that to me. No one else knows that meaning, no one cares nor do I know what those things mean to others. Soon I will be gone. Those things that meant something to me will soon cease to mean anything to anyone. They and I will be forgotten. That is what we get with a purely naturalistic reading of life. That is truly meaningless in any final or lasting sense. That sort of existence is a brute fact only. Some revel in the brute nature of such facts. But we must ask the question, not out of mere personal feeling but in spite of it: are these brute facts or deep structures? If the latter the things we have seen, the lives we live the deaths we all die are not merely brute facts. They are deep structures because they have meaning. They have a sort of meaning that lives on after us and is more than us. Of course a lot skeptics will say that I merely can't take anonymity. They can't either. If they can why do we leave things for posterity? Why do we care about how we leave the earth for future generations? While it seems that so many reductionists want to be robots and don't care about meaning if it's true they revel in being meaningless why do they blog? Why social media? Why are we concerned with what violence is purported upon others or what bigoted things Presidential candidates utter? Because meaning is more to us than just a private, relative, and through away. If that weren’t true we would not have sought so long for a logos or a TS or a theory of everything.

(7) Concept of God unites TS with universal mind, therefore, offers best explanation for a view that is RCM

God is Derrida's Prime example of TS. Nancy Murphy and James McClendon, speaking in the context of Derriodian thought, state, "Without God, who has been the ultimate Transcendent Signified, there is no central perspective, no objective truth of things, no real thing beyond language."[10]  Creating, ordering, and sustaining the cosmos and grounding meaning and all reality would require a metaphysical ἀρχή (first principal) with God-like attributes (from the glossary: The eternal and necessary foundational aspect of all being which creates all things and chooses to do so is compatible with the definition of "God" found in any many major world religions, including Christianity ).

God and Mind

I am arguing for warranted religious belief, and belief in God in a general sense, not for any particular tradition, I do have Christian belief and I am committed to the Christian tradition and to a relationship with Jesus, but I am bracketing that for now to deal with the ideas in a more general sense. I understand God to be universal mind which is not only part of the basis of Christian mysticism and the orthodox Church but also reflected in such modern thinkers as Paul Tillich,[11] John Macquarrie,[12] and Hans Urs Von Balthasar.[13] Tillich and others filter it through Heidegger, saying God is being itself. In History of Christian Thought Tillich interprets Dionysius to say God is the ground of everything, the super essential God beyond everything, inclining Platonic ideas and essences, he says Dionysius thought God is God beyond God (Ibid). That ties the Dionysian concept decisively to Tillich's view.[14]

If we want a rational view of the universe we need to plug mind back in to our understanding. There is a problem in that the imposition of a TS may be understood as a contradiction to the Heidegerrian/Tlillichian view that discussed above.

NOTES

[1]xxi Alfred North Whitehead. Science and The Modern World, NY: free Press, 1925, (1953) p.76

[2]xxii Aristotle, Physics, 184a10–21

[3]xxiii Con Davis, Roger. Criticism and Culture: The Role of Critique In Modern Literary Theory, Harloow, England:Longman Group United Kingdom; 1 edition (April 13, 1995)

[4]xxivDavid Chalmers “Facing up to the Problem of Consciousness,” On line resource University of Arizona, URL:

http://consc.net/papers/facing.html accessed 11/25/16

Chalmer's concept for for summing up the unresolved aspect of consciousness studies, a precise understanding of what conciousness actually is a nd how to understand itat the experioential level, and how it differed from brain function and what causes it,

[5]xxvThomas Nagel, Mind and Cosmos:Why the Materialist Neo-Darwinian Conception of Nature is Almost Certainly False,. Oxfor: Oxford, London: New York University Press, first edition, 2012,3.(see chapter 1). The reason why a rendition of bran functions is not answer to the hard problem is because the question demands an understanding from the inside out,

[6]xxvi Raymond Tallis, “Ideas for Godless People” New Haumanist.org.uk (blog—online researche) volume 124 Issue 6 (Nov/Dec 2009) URL: http://newhumanist.org.uk/2172/neurotrash  acessed 5/9/12

[7]xxviiIbid

[8]xxviiiThomas Nagel, Mind and Cosmos:...op cit., 3.

[9]xxixIbid.

[10]xxx Nancy Murphy and James McClendon jr." Distinguishing Modern and Postmodern Theologies." Modern Theology, 5:3 April 1989, 211

[11]xxxiPaul Tillich, Systematic Theology volume II, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1957, 10-11.

[12]xxxiiJohn MacQuarrie Principles of Christian Theology. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1966. 92,97

[13]xxxiiiHans Urs Von Balthasar “A Resume of my Thought,” in David L. Schindler,Hans Urs Von Balthasar: His Life and Work. San Francisco:Ignatious Press, 1991, 3.

[14]xxxivPaul Tillich, A History of Christian thought, New York, NY:TouchStonme books. 1967, 92