Logical Positivism and White Light
“Can you link? Perhaps quickly explain?”
Sure. This post relates most directly to transcending Logical Positivism,
Wittgenstein in Wonderland, Einstein under Glass
there are a lot of pages and posts on the site that refer back to how physical and metaphysical assumptions can both be transcended.
Briefly, what I suggest is that rather than assuming physical and mental isolation as objectively true, we should assume the opposite and see isolation as a localization of totality, in the same way that ‘green’ is a localization of white, and white is really transparency or visual sensitivity itself which is too bright for us to see through*.
The universe, consciousness, physics, mathematics, are all understandable as parts of the whole through triangulation of symmetric relations. Rather than spurning the thin air of the metaphysical or the mess of the anthropological, we should understand that their lack of sterile certainty reflects our own proximity to it, and that certainty itself is a function of distance – an illusion of monolithic realism to play against a reality of layered fiction. Physics is not realism, but the capacity to modulate realistic fiction against itself. Physics is participatory sense, and sense has understandable features which cut across all layers and scales of experience.
*This thought deserves to be developed in more depth. What is the color white? We know from basic science that white is a kind of jumble of all of the wavelengths of visible light. If we think about how we encounter white light in nature, however, it is often as a reflection in something transparent or shiny like water or glass. If you have ever tried to paint water, you know that it is about carefully placed contrasts of bright/white and dark paint.
Likewise, the brilliance of a white diamond is a reflection of its high refractive index – its just soo transparent from so many different angles than your eye can’t handle it. Given some level of ambient illumination, the visual sense is opened up beyond the human spec, and there’s too much to see through. It’s meta-transparent. As with all media, when the spec limit is exceeded, the guts of the medium itself begins to be exposed. What happens when there’s too much data on your internet connection? Freezing, pixelation. The digital substrate is exposed. Same thing with lens flares, records skipping, static on the radio, etc. The fabric which is carrying the message bleeds into the message. Light is the same way – too much potential clarity is blinding. Too much positivity and logic obscures the reality of the consciousness which creates it.
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