Prospects for a Phenomenological Idealism

[ScottRoberts]

Right, the change from outer experience to inner experience of thinking is definitely the most stark. If one considers it in terms of a change from the necessary obeyance of natural and cultural authorities for moral guidance to the possibility of following only one's increasingly lucid conscience, then we arrive at the core theme of the 2nd half of PoF and 'ethical individualism'.

Well, I think one can arrive at 'ethical individualism' without one's conscience being especially lucid. I would say it is implicit in 18th century Enlightenment thinking.

In my mind, the key is to show how the "not experienced" is experienced if we pay enough attention, and ideally how it is experienced in the very act of exploring the question of how it is experienced. Until then, the 'supernatural cause' will elude us or remain hopelessly abstract, because our normal habit of thinking will find satisfactory explanations for the evidence presented in natural causes or cultural conventions. Or it will go the Kantian route and say "this isn't satisfactory, but the only possibility of satisfaction is once the veil is lifted for me by physical death". So I'm not sure how to establish that part of Part I without already blending into Part II, i.e. metaphors that compare parts of our familiar experience and understanding to experience of higher worlds.

The bold bit is Part II talk, not Part I. One can't "establish" anything in Part I. Only argue for, philosophically (with some empirical observations, like the evolution of consciousness data). Or at least that's how I think of it.

[AshvinP]

Right, the change from outer experience to inner experience of thinking is definitely the most stark. If one considers it in terms of a change from the necessary obeyance of natural and cultural authorities for moral guidance to the possibility of following only one's increasingly lucid conscience, then we arrive at the core theme of the 2nd half of PoF and 'ethical individualism'.

Well, I think one can arrive at 'ethical individualism' without one's conscience being especially lucid. I would say it is implicit in 18th century Enlightenment thinking.

Yes, it is implicit in many developments since ancient Egypt, Greece, and especially the Incarnation, but until recently our sense of what is ethical has been based on cultural conventions related to the life of the race, the nation, the tribe, the family, and so forth. In the modern era, we get a shift towards the life of the individual as such, but I would say that is still mostly rooted in the individual as conceived in relation to past (manifest) forms of being. The ethical individualism of PoF, in contrast, moves to the individual as experienced in relation to future (potential) shared ideals that attract its experiential stream. These attractive shared ideals have always been there shaping the manifest spectrum, but now we can awaken to their substantial reality. The potential individual can be put on an experiential plane of equivalence with the manifest individual.

In my mind, the key is to show how the "not experienced" is experienced if we pay enough attention, and ideally how it is experienced in the very act of exploring the question of how it is experienced. Until then, the 'supernatural cause' will elude us or remain hopelessly abstract, because our normal habit of thinking will find satisfactory explanations for the evidence presented in natural causes or cultural conventions. Or it will go the Kantian route and say "this isn't satisfactory, but the only possibility of satisfaction is once the veil is lifted for me by physical death". So I'm not sure how to establish that part of Part I without already blending into Part II, i.e. metaphors that compare parts of our familiar experience and understanding to experience of higher worlds.

The bold bit is Part II talk, not Part I. One can't "establish" anything in Part I. Only argue for, philosophically (with some empirical observations, like the evolution of consciousness data). Or at least that's how I think of it.

Right, but my sense is that the supernatural cause will not allow itself to be argued for conceptually, only established experientially, at first in our imagination through phenomenological and metaphorical-analogical thinking. The latter serves as a bridge between the conceptual and experiential. If we think about the telos of consciousness evolution, to expand our conceptual activity back into the spheres of imagination+, that is what makes the most sense right? My sense is that the more we can align our conceptual endeavors with that telos, the more fruitful they will be.

[ScottRoberts]

Scott, thank you for addressing all of them! I would only insist on one point, if I may.
I don’t understand how the idea that "a triangle has a reference to the ideational activity of higher beings" is esoteric for you. What if we call the beings "intelligences"? Is it not inevitable in an idealistic conception that the ideas are active (living) realities, interacting with one another in some ways? Even BK speaks of a likely metaconscious mind@large. Is MAL also esoteric?

....

I consider the idea "idealism is true" to be esoteric. I accept it, and think in terms of it, but only because it makes more sense of things than what common sense tells me (which is naive dualism). So all that follows from idealism, like MAL, higher beings, etc. is esoteric. But some esotericisms can be accepted just by philosophic argument, once one accepts idealism. But it remains the case that they are not experienced. For example, I accept that there are higher beings because I can't imagine that natural evolution occurring by chance can overcome entropy.

(By the way, doesn't BK reject a metaconscious MAL? Unless he has changed his position. Last I heard he equates MAL with Schopenhauer's blind will.)

As for triangles, I can accept that "re-create" is not the best term. Re-imagine? I am thinking of the moment when one thinks "triangle". Yes, one is involving one's thinking with the eternal, single concept of triangle, but putting the three sides together is an act of imagination.

However, I can't say that I can agree with calling the triangle concept a "being", in the sense that we are beings. Does it think? will? feel? I'm not denying that at some higher level that is the case, just not accepting it. It is way too esoteric, for me.

Meanwhile, we have the term 'non-referential'. If one accepts the reality of higher levels of ideational activity, then it needs to modified as 'apparently non-referential. But in the experience of normal consciousness it is non-referential, as there is nothing one is aware of it to which it refers.

[Federica]

doesn't BK reject a metaconscious MAL? Unless he has changed his position. Last I heard he equates MAL with Schopenhauer's blind will.

Yes you are right! I even wrote it myself not so long ago. I guess it’s a case of wish that overpowers remembrance

As for triangles, I can accept that "re-create" is not the best term. Re-imagine? I am thinking of the moment when one thinks "triangle". Yes, one is involving one's thinking with the eternal, single concept of triangle, but putting the three sides together is an act of imagination.

Beyond vocabulary, I would suggest a slight rephrasing: "I am thinking of the moment when I think "triangle". Yes, I am involving my thinking with the eternal, single concept of triangle, and putting the three sides together is an act of imagination."

The way I see it, these two acts are the same thing. If we zoom out of physical existence for a moment, and focus on the imaginative creation (let’s say that) of the triangle, we have to say: within reality, there only exists ideational activity, that is, dynamic, willed. The activity is willed by “whatever is responsible for our and our environment's existence”, by God and God’s ideational organization (=reality), of which I am necessarily a part, since I exist. I am an integral part of this organized ideational activity, including now, as the creator of the triangle.

So, yes there is our intentional creativity, but the substance, the structure (concept), the process that allow for the finished product-triangle have to flow in from somewhere. Just because the triangle is ideational and not a piece of matter, doesn’t mean it pops up out of nothing, as non-referential creation. Otherwise we can just as well say that the whole of reality is nothing, since it’s all ideational. But obviously ideal substances and activities are something, and no part of reality is non-referential.

However, I can't say that I can agree with calling the triangle concept a "being", in the sense that we are beings. Does it think? will? Feel?

Yes it's a being/a concerted interplay of beings. Not in the sense that we are beings, since we have a gross material layer, but in the sense that you have described in your essay, speaking of God and His activity. The difficulty arises if we think of things or triangles as “thoughts of God” sort of like secretions, expelled units that are not living by themselves, that God has to “maintain in existence” from an external position. But if we recall ideas like concentricity, articulated interplay, and extend God’s living (willing thinking feeling) quality to the whole of reality, then, I believe, we come to a more helpful image.

[Federica]

At this point of this interesting discussion I am prompted to pitch the following idea

I consider the idea "idealism is true" to be esoteric.

By "the purpose" I mean coming up with a text that provides a philosophical basis for anthroposophy free of any esotericism, but indicates a path to freedom. I think this can be done with the only requirement being that one accepts idealism.

...

I can't say that I can agree with calling the triangle concept a "being"

If idealism is true, then we are insane, in that we look out at the world and don't perceive it as it is, as an environment of ideational activity. This is not a new idea, but now, in the age of the consciousness soul, one can do something about it, through radical re-thinking.

...
...
...
...
...
...
...

I am not trying to convince the skeptic. But then, that makes me wonder what I am trying to do.

...
...
...

I would say: to probe your inner thinking space, and convince your inner skeptic?

[ScottRoberts]

Right, but my sense is that the supernatural cause will not allow itself to be argued for conceptually, only established experientially, at first in our imagination through phenomenological and metaphorical-analogical thinking. The latter serves as a bridge between the conceptual and experiential. If we think about the telos of consciousness evolution, to expand our conceptual activity back into the spheres of imagination+, that is what makes the most sense right? My sense is that the more we can align our conceptual endeavors with that telos, the more fruitful they will be.

True, but the task at hand is to say why it is true.

[ScottRoberts]

As for triangles, I can accept that "re-create" is not the best term. Re-imagine? I am thinking of the moment when one thinks "triangle". Yes, one is involving one's thinking with the eternal, single concept of triangle, but putting the three sides together is an act of imagination.

Beyond vocabulary, I would suggest a slight rephrasing: "I am thinking of the moment when I think "triangle". Yes, I am involving my thinking with the eternal, single concept of triangle, and putting the three sides together is an act of imagination."

The way I see it, these two acts are the same thing. If we zoom out of physical existence for a moment, and focus on the imaginative creation (let’s say that) of the triangle, we have to say: within reality, there only exists ideational activity, that is, dynamic, willed. The activity is willed by “whatever is responsible for our and our environment's existence”, by God and God’s ideational organization (=reality), of which I am necessarily a part, since I exist. I am an integral part of this organized ideational activity, including now, as the creator of the triangle.

So, yes there is our intentional creativity, but the substance, the structure (concept), the process that allow for the finished product-triangle have to flow in from somewhere. Just because the triangle is ideational and not a piece of matter, doesn’t mean it pops up out of nothing, as non-referential creation. Otherwise we can just as well say that the whole of reality is nothing, since it’s all ideational. But obviously ideal substances and activities are something, and no part of reality is non-referential.

However, I can't say that I can agree with calling the triangle concept a "being", in the sense that we are beings. Does it think? will? Feel?

Yes it's a being/a concerted interplay of beings. Not in the sense that we are beings, since we have a gross material layer, but in the sense that you have described in your essay, speaking of God and His activity. The difficulty arises if we think of things or triangles as “thoughts of God” sort of like secretions, expelled units that are not living by themselves, that God has to “maintain in existence” from an external position. But if we recall ideas like concentricity, articulated interplay, and extend God’s living (willing thinking feeling) quality to the whole of reality, then, I believe, we come to a more helpful image.

Would you say that I am saying mostly the same thing (about triangles) if I put it this way:

- There is ideational activity. Activity is ideational if there is awareness of it, and it involves forms.
- The word 'idea' is just short for 'ideational act'.
- A form is that which distinguishes one idea from other ideas.
- There are no forms (a form is an abstraction). There are only ideas.
- There are no isolatable ideas. Every idea only occurs in relation to (ultimately) all other ideas.
- The power to form ideas, and the ideas formed, are a tetralemmic polarity -- each is, yet is not, the other.
- A triangle is an idea, and as such, inseparable from all other ideas, and inseparable from the power to think.

[ScottRoberts]

At this point of this interesting discussion I am prompted to pitch the following idea

I consider the idea "idealism is true" to be esoteric.

By "the purpose" I mean coming up with a text that provides a philosophical basis for anthroposophy free of any esotericism, but indicates a path to freedom. I think this can be done with the only requirement being that one accepts idealism.

...

I can't say that I can agree with calling the triangle concept a "being"

If idealism is true, then we are insane, in that we look out at the world and don't perceive it as it is, as an environment of ideational activity. This is not a new idea, but now, in the age of the consciousness soul, one can do something about it, through radical re-thinking.

...
...
...
...
...
...
...

I am not trying to convince the skeptic. But then, that makes me wonder what I am trying to do.

...
...
...

I would say: to probe your inner thinking space, and convince your inner skeptic?

I think I would prefer the implied injunction of the Lessing quote: "Revelation is not rational when it is revealed, rather it is revealed so as to become rational". So one needs to modify "esotericism free" to "free of esotericism that we haven't been able to make rational". How to make some esotericism phenomenal would be reserved to Part II.

[AshvinP]

Right, but my sense is that the supernatural cause will not allow itself to be argued for conceptually, only established experientially, at first in our imagination through phenomenological and metaphorical-analogical thinking. The latter serves as a bridge between the conceptual and experiential. If we think about the telos of consciousness evolution, to expand our conceptual activity back into the spheres of imagination+, that is what makes the most sense right? My sense is that the more we can align our conceptual endeavors with that telos, the more fruitful they will be.

True, but the task at hand is to say why it is true.

I view that task as similar to if our intuition led us to the brink of a committed and loving romantic or friendly relationship, but then we stop and wonder what assurances we can have that this relationship will work out and help us realize our potential and ideals. We ask to establish resonance with the person's soul-structure before we have put in the effort to cultivate that resonance. We are then asking for something that will surely elude us, because the resonant relationship only realizes its fruits when we enter into its experience with qualities of faith, trust, and hope, which are cognitive qualities imbued with deep longing and ideal striving. Why is it true that committed relationships with others help elevate our humanity? We can only say through the experience of the relationship itself. That doesn't mean we need to blindly enter the relationship without any idea of who the other person is or how they relate to us. We need a bridge that elucidates the broad relationship between us but simultaneously preserves its unique mystery and invites our cognitive-moral efforts to unveil it.

That being said, I guess my main question for you is how you envision that Part I will be distinguished from what you have already written in your essays. Are you aiming to elucidate any additional aspects of consciousness evolution and/or include any additional ways of reasoning to them?

[Federica]

I think I would prefer the implied injunction of the Lessing quote: "Revelation is not rational when it is revealed, rather it is revealed so as to become rational". So one needs to modify "esotericism free" to "free of esotericism that we haven't been able to make rational". How to make some esotericism phenomenal would be reserved to Part II.

Scott, I think Ashvin’s metaphor above is the most relatable, fitting reply, but to add something specific to the Lessing quote: I understand the convenience of it, in this juncture, but I don’t agree with a literal interpretation. In fluid terms, I agree we can become more acquainted with our experience of revelation, in the wake of it. But here’s the thing: before one can reduce and flatten an inner revelation to its rationalized backdrop imprint, one needs to first allow not for the revelation to manifest (revelations don’t manifest) but for one’s own inquisitive will to sense, feel and realize the process of its own becoming it, a living element of the revealed truth. Otherwise there’s nothing to imprint on the backdrop tablets of the bureaucratic-metaphysical storyboard.

In other words, one cannot rationalize any revealed objects. One can only become revelatory to oneself.