Wednesday, April 11, 2007

I don’t consider “metaphysics” to be a dirty word!

alan kazlev Says: April 10th, 2007 at 6:19 pm I differ from most others posting here (and from Ken) in that I don’t consider “metaphysics” to be a dirty word!
I’m a metaphysician and proud to wear that badge
alan kazlev Says: April 10th, 2007 at 6:23 pm I’m an esotericist and metaphysician with Aurobindonian and Theonist leanings.
And Edward I for one don’t consider you an a-hole! (strictly speaking, you cannot even consider yourself an aqal holon because that contradicts with pomo by assuming an ontology!)
Edward Berge Says: April 10th, 2007 at 6:34 pm Alan,
We’ve been through this before: Pomo doesn’t deny ontology, just that it can exist or be experienced apart from epistemology. In that sense, like Nagarjuna’s nonduality, they are “not two.” AQAL holonics separated from such a duality (ultimate/relative, ontology/epistemology) via dependent co-arising in emptiness is just fine as it is.
alan kazlev Says: April 10th, 2007 at 9:05 pm Yes but AQAL is still a narrative, still a creation story (as is materialism in general), it’s a metaphysical assumption based on an attempt to reconcile Cartesian dualism, physicalism, evolutionism (although this derives from Spencer, Comte etc rather than Darwin and his successors; Wilber’s evolutionism isn’t scientific, hence his sympathy for ID (while rejecting the religious element)), and Koestlerian holism.
But if according to pomo (and I am no authority, so you may well be right here) ontology cannot exist apart from epistemology, then wouldn’t you have the ridiculous premise that the rest of the physical universe didn’t exist before humankind evolved? In which case where did huamnity come from? This is why I prefer hard science any day, when it comes to facts regarding the physical universe
But if by pomo is meant that our psychological and socio-cultural biases distort our interpretation of scientific and other data, so that we make it into narratives and creation stories that fit our preconbceived biases, then I agree with it 100%

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