A Linguistic Framework
Metaphysics is primarily concerned with the nature of being. Unfortunately, debate in metaphysics is often frustrated by the circular, imprecise semiotic handed down by ancient philosophers and their hope for obvious symmetry and coherence in the universe. Too frequently, strong minds chase one another around in circles during debate because they do not share identical meanings for critical words. For example, one person may argue with another for days in favor of the existence of God, only to find that the other person agrees with his observations of the world and the inference of a creator. The time was spent struggling with definition after definition: clarifying and equating (if possible) the body of connotation unconsciously tacked onto the people’s words.
Of all the disciplines in philosophy, metaphysics is the field most constrained by closed semiotics and insidious, ignorant tradition. Therefore, I have developed a system of space-time classification, a hierarchy of being which can serve as a framework for a linguistic reconstruction of sorts and perhaps streamline the web of meaning in which driven thinkers frequently are tangled.
All metaphysical systems must begin with certain fundaments which are often taken from science but usually go beyond the ostensive proofs offered by that diligent discipline. I resign myself to the immediate refutations which will be attempted by those who hold different fundaments than the few with which I must begin. To those, I can ask only that they hold their javelins to the close, when I will have completely circumnavigated the basic cycle of philosophy (as I call it) and have given them a niche in my theories.
The first assumption I make is that you exist. In writing or stating this assumption, two resultant meanings can be translated. The first is the fundament of Skepticism. The only means by which a wholly subjective metaphysics can be communicated is in the second person, because to explicate skepticism in the first person is incoherent. The reader, if attentive, should doubt the author’s existence, thereby doubly doubting its claim that it exists. Further, the writer hamstrings himself by writing long essays intended to be read by that which he believes to be illusory or in doubt. So the skeptics have now been served their first morsel; fitting as theirs are the most devastating claws. The second resultant meaning is that, for me (as writer/speaker), you exist; that is, have a real being in space-time. At the moment, I am not concerned with what composes that reality; I only assert that the (Aristotelian) efficient cause of my perception of you is localized and external to my being. From this assertion, my existence can be affirmed; in order to make a statement about you—whose existence I assume—I and my perceptions of you must exist. (This is a relief!) In a sense, this denies the posture that skeptical readers will be holding; to them I say that I exist as a phantasm of themselves whispering to them through these pages. They cannot deny their perception’s existence.
So, with one assumption, your existence, I have generated the existence of space-time—if only for you. Your perception is sequentialized into discrete instants—you did not read “you” after you read “exist” in my initial premise, “you” preceded “exist”. Further, you did not have an innate knowledge that the phrase “you exist” was eminent—it’s origin was external to that part of you which says “I”, your self. Thus, since the originator of the phrase “you exist” can not share the same location that your self can, there must be an intervening position, however infinitesimal. (Even if you assert that the originator and experiencer can share position, the medium of communication then becomes the ‘external’ element and still necessitates SOME concept of space.)
I now move to the aforementioned system of describing the various derivations of your space-time… for your convenience.
I am forced to begin with what may be a boring synopsis of basic geometry. I do this in order to describe the progression of dimensions in geometry. At zero dimensions (0D), the only describable thing is a point. It is raw location, nothing but some arbitrary site, a unity, a totality, a singular no-thing. The next progression, to one dimension (1D), describes a line and therefore points. In a seeming paradox, 1D is an infinite sum of densely packed nothing: points. A line is therefore nothing but an infinite, dense series of locations, or a range of locations. At two dimensions (2D), a plane is described, lines and points as well. A plane is the aggregate of a infinite number of lines, densely packed, side by side. Finally, Euclid leaves off with three dimensions (3D), which describes space. Space is an infinite number of dense parallel planes. With these three progressions, a pattern is evident. Integration of this recurring idea leads to the following: for a given dimension X,
a) where X <> 0D, X is composed of an infinite series of dense (X-1)D things;
b) where X is 0D, it is a spatial unit.
Thus far, this essay has endeavored to be descriptive of the abstract sub-dimensions of this space-time; this is in keeping with the descriptive nature of language. Henceforth, I will shift gears to a prescriptive analysis of being utilizing the above Observation A and a Principle of Harmony. As electrons orbit their gravid obsession; so does the earth, the sun; the Milky Way’s arms, the galactic core. As the balancing of an equation is to the balancing of a see-saw, as polarity of thought and language is to polarity of sub-atomics and ions: thus am I willing to assert that the abstract principle derived above can be applied to the concrete world of time and energy.
At four dimensions—the first temporal progression—I introduce reality to the hierarchy, for it is an inviolable fact that reality is “immersed” in time. Understand, however, that the reality from which I am writing is a human reality. In an absolute sense, beginning reality at 4D is a purely arbitrary decision. A 2D being would begin its reality at 2D, because that is the degree of being at which it exists. Yet I nonetheless must prove that humanity is real at 4D. To do so requires describing the nature of 4D.
The fourth dimension is a temporal unit or temporal instant, just as a point is a spatial unit. It, through Observation A, is composed of an infinite, dense series of 3D things. In other words, because 4D supervenes on 3D, it must have space inherent to its composition. In order to harmonize the idea of a dense infinite series of spaces composing each temporal instant, I am lead to believe that this density of space generates energy and subsequently, through the laws of quantum physics, matter.
At this point, I must introduce my final assertion. Because each event requires an efficient cause, there must be, at the core of being for humanity, a source of the causal energy which initiates a given person’s actions. I will not delve into the nature of this efficient cause in this work; I merely require its existence at the 4D level to proceed with the prescriptions of the higher abstract dimensions, or super-dimensions.
At any given instant, an individual has the option, basically, to act or not to act. The result of that decision defines the next temporal instant for that person. In that next instant, the action (or non-action which, because it shares efficient cause with action, is essentially the same) is propagated; action potentials in neurons flow, muscles contract, shaped sounds are uttered, another’s heart is broken. There was a cusp in the individual’s life, and one potential path was taken. Somehow, however, the causal connections must be made; Xeno defined this problem millennia ago. How, then, can a person’s efficient cause, or will, move from temporal instant to temporal instant? Fifth dimensionally.
Moving on to the fifth dimension simply requires another integration or unification through Observation A. 5D is composed of an infinite, dense series of temporal instants. This leads to the conclusion that a given thing’s reality is infinite, which is true, for energy is neither created nor destroyed, it simply changes form and location. You were once, in part, soil to nourish corn which fed your mother and so forth. The energy which composes your efficient cause is eternal. This does not necessarily mean that your mind is eternal, just the energy which forms it. Therefore, your will can be said to flow through the fifth dimension, receiving input and generating output at temporal instants (psychiatry tells us that this seems to occur about every quarter of a second). Whether or not this kernel of efficient cause is free or determined is, at the fifth dimension, irrelevant; the quality defined as free or determined is a 4D concern, for at the fifth dimension all time for a particular timeline is defined. In a sense, therefore, our being can be said to be “determined” 5D (which it must be) or 4D (which is arguable): this is one of the damning ambiguities of the language.
Keep in mind also that Observation A states that 5D is but one infinite, dense series of 4D. Remember that, as 4D, an individual retains a range of possibilities; only one emerges in the next instant. Thus, an integration to 5D is of a particular series of events for a thing, infinite in length. The possibilities of the past instants which were not chosen do not, however, cease to exist. They had to exist to maintain the causal stream at the time of choice; there is no reason to believe that they cease to be once not needed by a particular 5D. In fact, there is good cause to believe that they still exist -always exist- for, if one’s kernel was to be able flow into them, they must have an energetic reality and energy is neither created nor destroyed. Rather, they exist in the sixth dimension, the last temporal integration.
6D is the aggregate of all that is, has been, will be, could be. Though we meager men live our civilization in but one timeline, we have, at thousands of millions of instances, been a choice away from a different one. If you have a passion for alternate realities, in 6D do they exist. It is a dense, infinite series of temporal lines. This induction provides the arena for debate on subjects ranging from Universals to God.
The question then remains, can integration continue? Are there another three levels of being to be inferred?
Humanity must manage itself through cognition. Typically, a 5D segment is contemplated, or a number of similar 5D segments are compared, to provide some insight into the relative possibilities of different resultant 4Ds occurring in future instants. This is proven by behavioral psychology and mere introspection. For example, if you look to the sky one day and notice cirrus clouds forming, you consider your body of 5D causal “streams” within your consciousness 5D line of being concerning meteorology to induce that—most likely—it will rain later that afternoon or evening. So human cognition is of, at least, 5D things (or, more accurately, nearly-5D things, as no one can consider an infinite series; being constrained to 4d prevents us). Often, and certainly within this work, human cognition will grapple with 6D. Any quest for absolutes is, at least, a search for that which is inherent to the sixth degree of being. Yet, beyond the basest fundament of energy, not much that is integral to 6D in all of its permutations is accessible to human science. Merely assuming that energy pervades 6D is an induction, because true integration to 6D requires an infinite number of 5Ds to be complete; we have but one in which our consciousnesses flow. To even collect data on two 5Ds would be infeasible and approaching null possibility in the foreseeable future. Once again, the skeptics have their ignorant absolution.
The basic consequence of this strictly abstract, hind-sighted relationship to those dimensions supervening upon ours is that we can have little or no relationship with dimensions beyond our space-time, our 5D. Perhaps once we have elevated our beings, our subjective realities, to fifth dimensional things, we may concern ourselves with God’s gods.
So what good, you may be asking yourself, is this hierarchy? As I stated in the opening of this essay, I hope that this system of regularizing the various levels of abstraction and being, and deriving a consistent progression, will reduce—at the very least—the number of arguments about chaps going back in time and killing their grandfathers. One, using the above system, could respond to such seeming paradoxes by explaining that, if a person can exit his 5D line to reenter it at a past 4D (which would, I agree, still exist), it is then the case that the man’s arrival in his past changes the flow of 4Ds in that timeline, thereby taking his consciousness on a sidetrack into a wholly alternate 5D and never meeting his actual grandfather. Theological arguments are radically streamlined because this system realizes the fact that all deific ideas are 6D, for they grapple with absolutes, and are, therefore, unknowable now. The animist and the materialist can sit at the same table without offending their guests, because the animist Oversoul, or Logos, or spirit performs the same basic function as the materialist’ gravity and inertia and radiation. Both are 6D abstractions of the interrelatedness of observed 4D things and derived 5D segments. Determinists and free-willers can stop their bickering, for this system shows that the former is assuming that the kernel of will is determined and the free-willer is arguing that it is not. Neither have studied these kernels directly; neither are qualified to presume. More often though, and regrettably, their dispute is due to the determinist beginning with the 5D sense of determined and assuming instants share the same quality that their aggregate does, while the free-willer begins with the moment, which seems to be laden with choice. There is no grounds for argument when the opponents base their premises at different levels of being. In similar manner could I show the incompatibility of continuum (6D), linear (5D), and quantum (4D) time theories to be mere inequity of degrees of being from which the views begin their assertions. Finally, as should now be apparent, interrelating the basic precepts of various philosophies can be effected through this hierarchy.
Examples:
animism: a cosmology which recognizes, at least, the continuity of 5D;
paganism: a theology which departmentalizes 6D into a satisfyingly complex bureaucracy and then worships them;
monotheism: a theology which worships 6D;
atheism: disbelief that 6D can be compressed or integrated into a unity -OR- disbelief that 6D is intentional;
idealism: a cosmology which begins reality at 6D and whose proponents frequently place their realities at 6D as well….
I therefore offer to you an explication of your being. Essentially, it is merely a definitional matrix which clarifies the subtleties of time, its influence on language, and its apparent nature. The fact that little is asserted in this essay is, I feel, one of its strengths; it is intended, after all, as only a tool for seeking answers, not the answers themselves; it is a legend, not a map. It provides a clear starting point for any philosophical discourse or discussion, and finally, and most admirably, diffuses some of the more annoying paradoxes spawned by our linguistic legacy of ambivalence.