Metaphysics & Physical Reality
Hi Everyone (June, 2007)
I have just finished re-writing this page. The essay on metaphysics is
as short and simple as I can write it.
It is important because it shows us how to solve the problems of metaphysics
(thus also physics and philosophy)
by understanding how
matter exists and moves about in Space in a necessarily interconnected
way.
The page is a bit long because I have also included a short 'Definitions
of Metaphysics' which is useful, and this is followed by some great metaphysics
quotes from Aristotle, Gottfried Leibniz, David Hume, Immanuel Kant and
Albert Einstein.
Hope you find it useful.
Geoff Haselhurst
PS - I have also just finished re-writing the main philosophy page.
It relates very well with this page (and it will hopefully amuse you while
also explaining some profound truths about physical reality). I think you
will get great benefit from reading it (it is the result of 15 years study
of 3,500 years of knowledge - and it is short / concise).
What is Metaphysics / What is the Problem?
(Bradley,
1846-1924) We may agree, perhaps, to understand by Metaphysics an attempt
to know reality as against mere appearance, or the study of first principles
or ultimate truths, or again the effort to comprehend the universe, not
simply piecemeal or by fragments, but somehow as a whole.
Drop a ball. Notice that you do not see any obvious connection between
the ball and the earth - yet they are obviously connected because we see
the effect of this connection, the ball moves (accelerates) towards the
earth. The same argument applies to the Earth orbiting the sun, an electron
in an atom, how we can see stars across the universe.
We give these connections names, e.g. light and gravity, but no one knew
what these hidden causal connections were.
So you see the problem of metaphysics is simple and profound - to solve
it requires true knowledge
of physical reality, such that we could understand this hidden causal
connection that our senses tell us must exist, yet we do not see?
This is known to philosophers as Hume's
Problem of Causation and Necessary Connection, but really it is common
knowledge that dates back to the ancients - the Problem
of the One and the Many.
It
must certainly be allowed, that nature has kept us at a great distance
from all her secrets, and has afforded us only the knowledge of a few superficial
qualities of objects; while she conceals from us those powers and principles
on which the influence of those objects entirely depends. (Hume,
1737)
When we look about us towards external objects, and consider
the operation of causes, we are never able, in a single instance, to discover
any power or necessary connexion; any quality, which binds the effect to
the cause, and renders the one an infallible consequence of the other.
(Hume, 1737)
The Simple Solution to the Problem of Metaphysics
Aristotle was correct in his analysis, and does actually lead us to the
solution;
The
first philosophy (Metaphysics) is universal and is exclusively concerned
with primary substance. ... And here we will have the science
to study that which is just as that which is, both in its essence and
in the properties which, just as a thing that is, it has.
The entire preoccupation of the physicist is with things that contain within
themselves a principle of movement and rest. And to seek for this is to
seek for the second kind of principle, that from which comes the beginning
of the change.
(Aristotle, Metaphysics, 340BC)
Surprisingly, after such a long period of failure to solve this problem
we find that we can actually deduce the solution.
We just had to ask; What
is the Most Simple Science Theory of Reality?
i.e. To solve the problem of metaphysics you must describe reality in
terms of one Substance and its Properties - and this is necessarily the
most simple solution.
Significantly we can deduce that there is only one solution, a wave structure
of matter in Space - where space is a substance with the properties of
a continuously connected wave medium (thus explaining Aristotle's property
of activity / motion as being caused by the wave motion of Space).
And hopefully it is now more clear to you this profundity of metaphysics
- being central to: simplicity, unity, reality, necessary connection,
causation, logic, knowledge, certainty, senses, science and truth.
The articles at the top of the page show how the Wave
Structure of Matter (by explaining matter's necessarily interconnected
motion in space) solves numerous problems of knowledge found in postmodern Metaphysics, Physics and Philosophy (and
there are many problems that are caused by the discrete and separate
'particle' conception of matter!)
New Age (Postmodern) Metaphysical Spiritualism Vs. Classical Metaphysics
I like spiritual people, they are generally kind and cheerful. I think
a wise understanding of spiritualism is really just the enlightened view
that our discrete and separate bodies are an illusion (as Albert
Einstein realised), that we are really structures of the universe and
connected to everything around us.
A
human being is part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited
in time and space. We experience ourselves, our thoughts and feelings as
something separate from the rest. A kind of optical delusion of consciousness.
This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal
desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must
be to free ourselves from the prison by widening our circle of compassion
to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty… The
true value of a human being is determined primarily by the measure and
the sense in which they have obtained liberation from the self. … We
shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if humanity is to
survive. (Albert Einstein, 1954)
So I am not writing to offend you when I also say that there is a postmodern
'new age' metaphysics that twists the meaning of metaphysics in a dangerous
way, as it says that metaphysics, is 'beyond' our senses (and thus not
limited by them).
This distinction is very important. If we allow our human imaginations
free reign, without being constrained by the truth of our senses, then
we will invariably deceive ourselves by imagining fanciful things (and
this self deception causes us / our society harm - this is the foundation
of Philosophy, that we must know the truth
to act wisely and avoid harm).
By
his clear critique Hume did not only advance philosophy
in a decisive way but also - though through no fault of his - created a
danger for philosophy in that, following his critique, a fateful 'fear
of metaphysics' arose which has come to be a malady of
contemporary empiricist philosophising; this malady is
the counterpart to that earlier philosophising in the clouds, which thought
it could neglect and dispense with what was given by the senses. ... It
finally turns out that one can, after all, not get along without
metaphysics.
(Albert Einstein, Remarks on Bertrand Russell's
Theory of Knowledge)
Definitions of Metaphysics
I received these definitions in an email (I do not know
the source). But they are generally good (I have added a few comments in
brackets). Geoff
1: The philosophical study of being and knowing.
2: Metaphysics (Greek words meta = after/beyond and physics = nature)
is a branch of philosophy concerned with the study of 'first principles'
and 'being' (ontology).
3: The study of the nature and being of reality and its origin and structure.
4: A field of abstract thought and philosophy about topics not on the
concrete or physical level of understanding. This includes subjects like
existence, the soul, being, the supernatural, astral travel and psychicism.
(No. This is new age / postmodern view of metaphysics
as 'beyond our senses' rather than correctly as the hidden cause of our
senses. However, as the Wave Structure of Matter in Space explains, we
are actually structures of the universe and this will explain these 'apparently'
supernatural effects / subtle human senses.)
5: The manipulation of noetic symbols as if they were propositions.
6: Derived from the Latin word meta which means beyond, metaphysics would
literally mean that which is beyond the laws of physics. (No.
As above, 'beyond our senses' is misleading - metaphysics studies the hidden
causal connection of our visible senses.)
7: The study of the ultimate and fundamental reality. (Spot
on!)
8: 'Beyond physics.' The branch of philosophy that deals with first
principles and seeks to explain the nature of reality and the origin and
structure of the world. (No. Metaphysics is the source
of principles which found physics / science.)
9: Speculative thought about matters outside the perceivable physical
world.
10: A branch of philosophy exploring the nature of reality or being, and
usually finding the answers outside the physical world in God.
(No. God is just another human constructed word, so
this is meaningless.)
11: Philosophy of the mind, of knowing. (True. Metaphysics
must understand how we can see a rock fall - this requires a correct
understanding of the mind and how it is connected to the body / other
matter in Space.)
12: Philosophic inquiry into the ultimate and fundamental reality; 'the
science of being as such'.
Metaphysics Quotes
On Truth, Reality & Principles in Science
Aristotle Metaphysics
It
is clear, then, that wisdom is knowledge having to do with certain principles
and causes. But now, since it is this knowledge that we are seeking, we
must consider the following point: of what kind of principles and of what
kind of causes is wisdom the knowledge? (Aristotle, Metaphysics,
340BC)
Metaphysics involves intuitive knowledge of unprovable starting-points
(concepts and truth) and demonstrative knowledge of what follows from them.
(Aristotle, Metaphysics, 340BC)
Demonstration is also something necessary, because a demonstration
cannot go otherwise than it does, ... And the cause of this lies with the
primary premises/principles. (Aristotle, Metaphysics)
The first philosophy (Metaphysics) is universal and is exclusively
concerned with primary substance. ... And here we will have the science
to study that which is just as that which is, both in its essence and in
the properties which, just as a thing that is, it has. (Aristotle,
Metaphysics, 340BC)
The
entire preoccupation of the physicist is with things that contain within
themselves a principle of movement and rest. And to seek for this is to
seek for the second kind of principle, that from which comes the beginning
of the change. (Aristotle, Metaphysics, 340BC)
There must then be a principle of such a kind that its substance
is activity.
... it is impossible that the primary existent, being eternal, should be
destroyed.
... that among entities there must be some cause which moves and combines
things.
... about its coming into being and its doings and about all its alterations
we think that we have knowledge when we know the source of its movement.
(Aristotle, Metaphysics, 340BC)
For those who wish to make good progress must start well;
for subsequent progress depends on the resolution of the first puzzles,
and one cannot solve these without knowing the difficulty and the confusion
of our minds. So we must first set out all the difficulties, both for these
reasons and also because those who inquire without first setting out the
difficulties are like those who do not know in which direction they should
walk, and in addition do not even know whether they would recognize that
which they are looking for. For the end is not clear to these, but it is
for those who have begun with the puzzles. And also from the point of view
of judging that man is better off who has heard, as it were, all the rival
and opposed positions. (Aristotle, Metaphysics)
Gottfried Leibniz on Metaphysics (Monadology)
(Gottfried
Leibniz, 1670) It is a good thing to proceed in order and to
establish propositions (principles). This is the way to gain ground and
to progress with certainty. ... I hold that the mark of a genuine idea
is that its possibility can be proved, either a priori by
conceiving its cause or reason, or a posteriori when
experience teaches us that it is a fact in nature.
Indeed in general I hold that there is nothing truer than
happiness, and nothing happier and sweeter than truth. (Leibniz,
1670)
I agree with you that it is important to examine our presuppositions,
thoroughly and once for all, in order to establish something solid. For
I hold that it is only when we can prove all that we bring forward that
we perfectly understand the thing under consideration. I know that the
common herd takes little pleasure in these researches, but I know also
that the common herd take little pains thoroughly to understand things.
(Leibniz, 1670)
...
a distinction must be made between true and false ideas, and that too much
rein must not be given to a man's imagination under pretext of its being
a clear and distinct intellection. (Leibniz, 1670)
But it is the knowledge of necessary and eternal truths
which distinguishes us from mere animals, and gives us reason and the sciences,
raising us to knowledge of ourselves and God. It is this in us which we
call the rational soul or mind. (Leibniz, 1670)
When a truth is necessary, the reason for it can be found
by analysis, that is, by resolving it into simpler ideas and truths until
the primary ones are reached. It is this way that in mathematics speculative
theorems and practical canons are reduced by analysis to definitions, axioms
and postulates. (Leibniz, 1670)
David Hume Metaphysics Quotes: On Causation / Necessary
Connection
It
must certainly be allowed, that nature has kept us at a great distance
from all her secrets, and has afforded us only the knowledge of a few superficial
qualities of objects; while she conceals from us those powers and principles
on which the influence of those objects entirely depends. (Hume,
1737)
When we look about us towards external objects, and consider
the operation of causes, we are never able, in a single instance, to discover
any power or necessary connexion; any quality, which binds the effect to
the cause, and renders the one an infallible consequence of the other.
(Hume, 1737)
... experience only teaches us, how one event constantly
follows another; without instructing us in the secret connexion, which
binds them together, and renders them inseparable. (Hume,
1737)
We then call the one object, Cause; the other, Effect. We
suppose that there is some connexion between them; some power in the one,
by which it infallibly produces the other, and operates with the greatest
certainty and strongest necessity. (Hume, 1737)
Immanuel Kant Quotes on Metaphysics
Time
was, when she (Metaphysics) was the queen of all the sciences; and, if
we take the will for the deed, she certainly deserves, so far as regards
the high importance of her object-matter, this title of honour. Now, it
is the fashion of the time to heap contempt and scorn upon her; and the
matron mourns, forlorn and forsaken, like Hecuba .. her empire gradually
broke up, and intestine wars introduced the reign of anarchy; while the
sceptics, like nomadic tribes, who hate a permanent habitation and settled
mode of living, attacked from time to time those who had organized themselves
into civil communities. But their number was, very happily, small; and
thus they could not entirely put a stop to the exertions of those who persisted
in raising new edifices, although on no settled or uniform plan. (Immanuel
Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, 1781)
This can never become popular, and, indeed,
has no occasion to be so; for fine-spun arguments in favour of useful truths
make just as little impression on the public mind as the equally subtle
objections brought against these truths. On the other hand, since both
inevitably force themselves on every man who rises to the height of speculation,
it becomes the manifest duty of the schools to enter upon a thorough investigation
of the rights of speculative reason, and thus to prevent the scandal which
metaphysical controversies are sure, sooner or later, to cause even to
the masses. (Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason,
1781)
Albert Einstein on Principles in Physics
Note: This is a summary from the main Principles
in Physics page (which is very good).
All logic depends upon Principles which gives rise to necessary consequences
that are absolute and certain (rather than mere opinions). The aim of Science is
to demonstrate that these logical deductions from (a priori) Principles
exactly correspond with our sense of the real world from (a posteriori)
observation and experiment. Albert Einstein explains this Scientific method
very clearly;
(Albert
Einstein) Physics constitutes a logical system of thought which
is in a state of evolution, whose basis (principles) cannot be distilled,
as it were, from experience by an inductive method, but can only be arrived
at by free invention. The justification (truth content) of the system
rests in the verification of the derived propositions (a priori/logical
truths) by sense experiences (a posteriori/empirical truths).
... Evolution is proceeding in the direction of increasing simplicity
of the logical basis (principles). .. We must always be ready to change
these notions - that is to say, the axiomatic basis of physics - in order
to do justice to perceived facts in the most perfect way logically. (Albert
Einstein, Physics and Reality, 1936)
The development during the present century is characterized
by two theoretical systems essentially independent of each other: the theory
of relativity and the quantum theory. The two systems do not directly contradict
each other; but they seem little adapted to fusion into one unified theory.
For the time being we have to admit that we do not possess any general
theoretical basis for physics which can be regarded as its logical foundation.
(Albert Einstein, 1940)
If, then, it is true that the axiomatic basis of theoretical
physics cannot be extracted from experience but must be freely invented,
can we ever hope to find the right way? I answer without hesitation that
there is, in my opinion, a right way, and that we are capable of finding
it. I hold it true that pure thought can grasp reality, as the ancients
dreamed. (Albert Einstein, 1954)
Albert Einstein Quotes on Metaphysics
(Remarks on Bertrand Russell's Theory of Knowledge, 1954)
In
the evolution of philosophical thought
through the centuries the following question has played a major role: what
knowledge is pure thought able to supply independently of sense perception?
Is there any such knowledge? If not, what precisely is the relation between
our knowledge and the raw material furnished by sense impressions?
There has been an increasing skepticism concerning every
attempt by means of pure thought to learn something about the 'objective
world', about the world of 'things' in contrast to the
world of 'concepts and ideas'. During philosophy's childhood
it was rather generally believed that it is possible to find everything
which can be known by means of mere reflection. It was an illusion which
anyone can easily understand if, for a moment, he dismisses what he has
learned from later philosophy and from natural science; he will not be
surprised to find that Plato ascribed a higher reality
to 'ideas' than to empirically experienceable things. Even in Spinoza and
as late as in Hegel this prejudice was the vitalising force which seems
still to have played the major role.
The more aristocratic illusion concerning the unlimited penetrative power
of thought has as its counterpart the more plebeian illusion of naive
realism, according to which things 'are' as they are perceived
by us through our senses. This illusion dominates the daily life of men
and of animals; it is also the point of departure in all of the sciences,
especially of the natural sciences.
As Russell wrote;
'We all start from naive realism, i.e.,
the doctrine that things are what they seem. We think that grass is green,
that stones are hard, and that snow is cold. But physics assures us that
the greenness of grass, the hardness of stones, and the coldness of snow
are not the greenness, hardness, and coldness that we know in our own experience,
but something very different. The observer, when he seems to himself to
be observing a stone, is really, if physics is to be believed, observing
the effects of the stone upon himself.'
Gradually the conviction gained recognition that all knowledge about
things is exclusively a working-over of the raw material furnished by the senses. Galileo and Hume first
upheld this principle with full clarity and decisiveness. Hume saw that
concepts which we must regard as essential, such as, for example, causal
connection, cannot be gained from material given to us by the senses.
This insight led him to a skeptical attitude as concerns knowledge of any
kind. Man has an intense desire for assured knowledge. That is why Hume's
clear message seemed crushing: the sensory raw material, the only source
of our knowledge,through habit may lead us to belief and expectation but
not to the knowledge and still less to the understanding of lawful relations.
Then Kant took the stage with an idea which,
though certainly untenable in the form in which he put it, signified a
step towards the solution of Hume's dilemma: whatever in knowledge is
of empirical origin is never certain.
If, therefore, we have definitely assured knowledge,it must be grounded
in reason itself. This is held to be the case, for example, in the propositions
of geometry and the principles of causality. These and certain other types
of knowledge are, so to speak, a part of the implements of thinking and
therefore do not previously have to be gained from sense data (i.e. they
are a priori knowledge).
Today
everyone knows, of course, that the mentioned concepts contain nothing
of the certainty, of the inherent necessity, which Kant had attributed
to them. The following, however, appears to me to be correct in Kant's
statement of the problem: in thinking we use with a certain "right",
concepts to which there is no access from the materials of sensory experience,
if the situation is viewed from the logical point of view. As a matter
of fact, I am convinced that even much more is to be asserted: the concepts
which arise in our thought and in our linguistic expressions are all- when
viewed logically- the free creations of thought which
cannot inductively be gained from sense experiences.
This is not so easily noticed only because we have the habit of combining
certain concepts and conceptual relations (propositions) so definitely
with certain sense experiences that we do not become conscious of the gulf-
logically unbridgeable- which separates the world of sensory experiences
from the world of concepts and propositions. Thus, for example, the series
of integers is obviously an invention of the human mind, a self-created
tool which simplifies the ordering of certain sensory experiences. But
there is no way in which this concept could be made to grow, as it were,
directly out of sense experiences.
As soon as one is at home in Hume's critique one is easily
led to believe that all those concepts and propositions which cannot be
deduced from the sensory raw material are, on account of their 'metaphysical'
character, to be removed from thinking. For all thought acquires material
content only through its relationship with that sensory material. This
latter proposition I take to be entirely true; but I hold the prescription
for thinking which is grounded on this proposition to be false. For this
claim- if only carried through consistently- absolutely excludes thinking
of any kind as 'metaphysical'.
In order that thinking might not degenerate into 'metaphysics', or into
empty talk, it is only necessary that enough propositions of the conceptual
system be firmly enough connected with sensory experiences and that the
conceptual system, in view of its task of ordering and surveying sense
experience, should show as much unity and parsimony as
possible. Beyond that, however, the 'system' is (as regards logic) a free
play with symbols according to (logically) arbitrarily given rules of the
game. All this applies as much (and in the same manner) to the thinking
in daily life as to the more consciously and systematically constructed
thinking in the sciences.
By his clear critique Hume did not only
advance philosophy in a decisive way but also - though through no fault
of his - created a danger for philosophy in that, following his critique,
a fateful 'fear of metaphysics' arose which has come to
be a malady of contemporary empiricist philosophising;
this malady is the counterpart to that earlier philosophising in the clouds,
which thought it could neglect and dispense with what was given by the
senses. ... It finally turns out that one can, after all, not get
along without metaphysics.
(Albert Einstein, Remarks on Bertrand Russell's Theory
of Knowledge, Ideas and Opinions, 1954)
Note: Below are the main metaphysics pages - the Metaphysics
sitemap has the full list of pages.
Metaphysics & Physical Reality
RSS
"When
forced to summarize the general theory of relativity in one sentence: Time
and space and gravitation have no separate existence from matter. ... Physical
objects are not in space, but these objects are spatially extended.
In this way the concept 'empty space' loses its meaning. ... The particle
can only appear as a limited region in space in which the field strength or
the energy density are particularly high. ...
