Freedom of Religion

[genkaus]

Just because you have accepted that as a "primary axiom of existence" doesn't make it true.

This is what I mean when I say that you fail to grasp the premises of your own argument.

The axiom of primacy of existence is not a matter of truth or falsehood - it is an inescapable premise. It the concepts such as truth and falsehood are to have any meaning, if knowledge is to be possible, then this axiom must be accepted. You accept it yourself in its very denial.

There are many philosophies that can explain reality without relying on that simple model.

And they are wrong.

In fact, it's the Eastern Mystic's point of view that life is but a dream. Everything that we think is "out there" was actually dreamed up from within our mystic consciousness. There's no way you could disprove that.

Ofcourse, I can. Either this statement cannot be true without presupposing primacy of existence or it is necessarily false. If everything we perceive is a part of a dream, there are two possibilities.

1. All our perceptions in this "dream" are copied from actual perceptions in the "real" or "waking world". Which means, there is a waking world which is independent of our consciousness and holds primacy over the dreaming world. Ergo, primacy of existence.

2. If the dreaming world is all there is and there is no real world, then all our perceptions are product of our consciousness and all the facts out there are products of those perceptions.

Wow, let me try that out......

Nope, didn't work. (FYI I tried to perceive a hot stripper in front of me in order to make it into a fact.)

Moving on, we have established that "If everything we perceive is a dream, then all facts are necessarily dependent upon our consciousness". Using contra-position, we can say that "If there is a single fact that does not depend upon our consciousness, then everything we perceive cannot be a dream".

Here, you have two options. First, you can continue arguing that all facts are dependent upon consciousness (except for the fact "all facts are dependent upon consciousness" - fallacy of special pleading). Or you can admit that not all facts are dependent upon consciousness - leading us back to argument 1, thereby showing your reliance on "primacy of existence".

Thus, we've proven that "primacy of existence" is the necessary underlying axiom of all rational and logically consistent statements made and by elimination, "primacy of consciousness" cannot be.

You're just giving yet another example of how some people will simply dismiss anything that they don't believe in as being nonsense. If it doesn't match up with your world-view, then it's nonsense.

If it doesn't pass the standard of rationality, then it is nonsense. The argument you presented doesn't.