I guess this is the point where my neo-Platonic thinking starts to kick in. We clearly have a much different understanding of the abstraction. I think like an artist in this regard.
To make an abstraction, an artist selects generalized features representative of a particular thing or class of objects. This process results in a visual or auditory prompt that calls to mind the object represented. For example the artist extracts the visible outline and color impressions of a person to make a portrait. The portrait, as a symbol, prompts the mind to form a mental image of the person they represent. The symbol is an abstraction.
The exact opposite of an abstraction is a form. A form is that from which particular physical examples are abstracted. Forms are not vague abstractions extracted from many examples. Instead the various particular embodiments (abstractions) are each cruder versions of fuller and more comprehensive ideal forms. In Panentheism (or at least the kind I advocate) creation simply means formally causing something to exist. Because distinct entities have no definitive demarcation that separates them physically, their perceived relationship to the properties and qualities of a form allow us to recognize when any given thing can be considered part of a class of objects.
This does however open the door to Idealism which is a concept I find problematic for the reasons we’ve been discussing. And that is why I started the discussion. By reducing everything to operations of the mind, Idealism fails to address why physical relationships are even required. It seems to me, physicality somehow constrains mental activities. When some of the more strident members here talk about their belief that science will someday explain conscious experience, I find it more than a bit naïve. Such materialists are essentially claiming that conscious experience is produced by classical electro-chemical processes. That also is a self-refuting position, similar to Idealism. If conscious experience emerges from physical events, then some kind of proto-consciousness must be already present.
So I see a form-substance relationship extending throughout the totality. While they can be distinct aspects of reality, they can never be truly divided. Every substance has a form and every form has a substance. This is why I posit the existence of a pan-psychic medium, which I consider a primal substance, as something that embodies ideal form. This is both a top-down and bottom-up approach. While it is possible to view reality from either direction, top-down being Idealism and bottom-up being Materialism, I do not see how either can be complete without the other.
Of course none of this has as yet been confirmed experimentally, but we can at least see a possible interfacing mechanism between the part of reality governed by classical physics and the experiential part of reality. While I do not claim to understand the details of Penrose’s theories about sub-neural activity, what little I do know seems support this position.
To make an abstraction, an artist selects generalized features representative of a particular thing or class of objects. This process results in a visual or auditory prompt that calls to mind the object represented. For example the artist extracts the visible outline and color impressions of a person to make a portrait. The portrait, as a symbol, prompts the mind to form a mental image of the person they represent. The symbol is an abstraction.
The exact opposite of an abstraction is a form. A form is that from which particular physical examples are abstracted. Forms are not vague abstractions extracted from many examples. Instead the various particular embodiments (abstractions) are each cruder versions of fuller and more comprehensive ideal forms. In Panentheism (or at least the kind I advocate) creation simply means formally causing something to exist. Because distinct entities have no definitive demarcation that separates them physically, their perceived relationship to the properties and qualities of a form allow us to recognize when any given thing can be considered part of a class of objects.
This does however open the door to Idealism which is a concept I find problematic for the reasons we’ve been discussing. And that is why I started the discussion. By reducing everything to operations of the mind, Idealism fails to address why physical relationships are even required. It seems to me, physicality somehow constrains mental activities. When some of the more strident members here talk about their belief that science will someday explain conscious experience, I find it more than a bit naïve. Such materialists are essentially claiming that conscious experience is produced by classical electro-chemical processes. That also is a self-refuting position, similar to Idealism. If conscious experience emerges from physical events, then some kind of proto-consciousness must be already present.
So I see a form-substance relationship extending throughout the totality. While they can be distinct aspects of reality, they can never be truly divided. Every substance has a form and every form has a substance. This is why I posit the existence of a pan-psychic medium, which I consider a primal substance, as something that embodies ideal form. This is both a top-down and bottom-up approach. While it is possible to view reality from either direction, top-down being Idealism and bottom-up being Materialism, I do not see how either can be complete without the other.
Of course none of this has as yet been confirmed experimentally, but we can at least see a possible interfacing mechanism between the part of reality governed by classical physics and the experiential part of reality. While I do not claim to understand the details of Penrose’s theories about sub-neural activity, what little I do know seems support this position.
