Hold on. A side remark echoing some off line debate: anything we are discussing here can have any meaning at all only if we assume that there exists an objective reality given us through senses.
If the reality is fully subjective, that is, existing only in our minds, then indeed there is no such thing as falling upwards, because there is no up or down, for these notions will mean utterly different things for different minds. There is neither understanding nor common ground between minds either – what do we share at all if not the real world, in other words, existence?
Of course I remember Kant (was fascinated!): no reality exists fully and solely in itself, without being subject to the influence of the perceiving mind; the beauty is in the eye of the beholder. We do perceive reality in our unique ways, and our perception is crucially important, reality-altering.
But this does not seem to contradict the idea of the objective reality. To me, this interaction between the objective content given to us, and its subjective transformation by our minds represent the dynamic process by which God eternally creates His world – infinitely complex, dazzlingly beautiful, mysterious, puzzling. Our minds do matter; we are not just passively receiving the world as it is – we are really participating in its creation by exercising our subjectivity. God takes us very seriously - we are not His pets, we are keepers and co-authors of His reality!
So to me, all reality is objective, that is, given to us through senses as a dynamic content to which we have shared access and which we subjectively transform, being in this co-creators of God's world.
Oups! A Leffe please!:))
Oups! A Leffe please!:))
Ah, yes see what you mean. well said (as usual) Reminds me a bit though of someone saying that an aeroplane can't really fly at all - all that metal, all those people! It's only because all the people in the plane believe it can fly that it does, if only one person on board stops believing the thing will crash out of the sky :-)
ReplyDeleteYes - that would be the position of those who maintain that reality is full subjective; there is a clever scholarly word for these people, I forgot... I maintain on the contrary that the aeroplane will fly whatever you personally think of it (you may even imagine it crawls in the desert actually), but the altitude, direction, position at any given moment, perhaps even shape and what is on board would be determined by how you think AND act, in coordination with other passengers and the Pilot. It won't crash just because you think it might (anxiety!), but will be slowing down or changing direction. But if you, inspired by Pilot, decide to pull up, then the whole structure will be going up: that's how grace works! In the end of the day, we are not the ones at the wheel, and I find it infinitely reassuring :).
ReplyDelete"joy-stick" dearest M, not a "wheel" but a "JOY-STICK" ;-)
ReplyDeleteooh-err joy-stick. Happy flying;-)
ReplyDelete