| | Michael,
All I'm prepared to give now is a small expansion on the quote from page 262 of the DIM Hypothesis:
A creator may consider causality as a principle of Nature learned through observation, and look for causes accordingly; or as a product of God's will learned a priori; or as a product of human consciousness learned subjectively; or as a baseless but convenient hypothesis. That's 4 ways to view a "discovery" of causality in the world:
1) principles discovered through inductive observation of external reality
2) rules discovered through privileged-access revelations (from God, etc.) stemming from your internal reality
3) stuff you personally "remember" from your personal "experiences" with the world
4) potentially-crazy conjectures that are still waiting to be refuted (and should, therefore, be utilized in the meantime)
1) Realism
2) Idealism
3) Existentialism
4) Pragmatism
(1) is proper science, (2) is "proper" religion, (3) is a "proper" rejection of the reality of an external world (and the simultaneous exaltation of your own private, personal will as being your own god, and (4) is a fall-back position that you take after you realize how futile (3) is -- it is a bandage the creation of which was caused by the prior damage of adopting (3) wholeheartedly and then experiencing the god-awful results of that.
You adopt pragmatism not because you are done with existentialism, but because you are still in the grips of existentialism and want to figure out a way that you can stay there (instead of figuring out how to refute it) and still be able to live with and among other people in the process. This means that pragmatism is not actually a different worldview, it is one of the first 3 worldviews combined with a natural human desire for social connectivity, bonding, or intimacy with others.
By elevating themselves up to being a (personal) god, existentialists necessarily detract from the reality or importance of others. If two existentialists meet and disagree -- which should be more common than not -- then they can only fight with or flee from each other. Willful submission of the "I" to the "Thou" -- unless under the Nietzschean assumption of actual spiritual superiority -- is not an option.
Alternatively, on an existentialist's premise, everyone's feelings could be put into a pot or a hat and then drawn out of that hat one by one and collectively ridiculed. And any strips of paper drawn from the hat which are still waiting to be ridiculed out of existence/importance can be considered as being in the category: not-currently-refuted. It (pragmatism) is a way, perhaps the only way, for existentialists to coexist peacefully.
Ed
(Edited by Ed Thompson on 9/01, 12:44pm)
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